


Being Normal (Should Be The Least of Our Worries)

by Kiminiren



Category: EXID (Band), EXO (Band), ITZY (Band), Red Velvet (K-pop Band), SHINee, TWICE (Band), 방탄소년단 | Bangtan Boys | BTS, 소녀시대 | Girls' Generation | SNSD
Genre: Alternate Universe - Soulmates, Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Alternate Universe - X-Men Fusion, Angst, Blind Character, Blood and Gore, Child Loss, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, F/M, Hanahaki Disease, M/M, Nudity, Original Character(s), Red String of Fate, Romance, Suicide Attempt, Temporary Character Death
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-11
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-08 20:07:20
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 36,996
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27202225
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kiminiren/pseuds/Kiminiren
Summary: “Your mutation may be the first thing people see but that doesn’t define you.  You’re the only version of yourself but you want to be normal?  Being normal should be the least of your worries.”ORA superhero/supervillain AU in which in an unspecified distant future, political and social tensions are at an all-time high, creating a painfully obvious division between humans and mutants, not only just socially, but — between the two lifeforms — physically.  Humans are terrified of those with powers and mutants live a life of constant rejection.Can becoming normal break the boundary?  Or does realizing you’re one in million worth the fight?
Relationships: Jeon Jungkook/Min Yoongi | Suga, Jeon Jungkook/Son Chaeyoung, Jung Hoseok | J-Hope/Chou Tzuyu, Kang Seulgi/Park Jimin (BTS), Kim Namjoon | RM/Kim Seokjin | Jin, Kim Taehyung | V/Im Yoona
Comments: 7
Kudos: 14





	1. Intro

**Introduction of the Characters**

( By Appearance )

* * *

**Chou Tzuyu** | Mutant  
Alias: _Polar_

Has the ability to manipulate ice by freezing water vapor in the air.

**Jung Hoseok** | Mutant  
Alias: _Solar Flare_

Has the ability to create and shape all aspects of the sun.

**Min Yoongi** | Human  
Alias: Unknown

An exceptional marksman.

**Jeon Jungkook** | Mutant  
Alias: _Mercy_

Has the ability to feel others' emotions and pain through touch.

**Son Chaeyoung |** Mutant  
Alias: Unknown

Has the ability to mind read and control one's mind through touch.

**Kim Yoona** | Human

Taehyung's wife.

**Kim Taehyung** | Mutant  
Alias: _Picaro_

Has the ability to absorb power and life through touch.

**Kim Namjoon** | Human

A lieutenant detective at the Seoul City Police Department.

**Kim Seokjin** | Mutant  
Alias: _Tux_

Has the ability to teleport and defy gravity.

**Park Jimin** | Mutant  
Alias: _Kitty P_

Has the ability to persuade others and phase through solid matter.

**Kang Seulgi** | Mutant  
Alias: _Echo_

Has the ability to detect and manipulate sound and sound waves using echolocation.


	2. The Prologue

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You’re not even gonna give us a chance?”
> 
> “We're two different kinds of people... We’d never work out.”

* * *

**PROLOGUE: Tzuyu's Origin**

* * *

“Sorry,” Tzuyu quickly apologizes. She tries to smile through her tears as she reaches for the box of tissue that's offered to her. “I get like this every time I talk about him.”

Talking about her past is always hard. Thinking about _him_ is always hard.

“That's okay,” her therapist tells her as she sets the tissue on the floor. “Your feelings are valid. It's okay to cry.”

Tzuyu absently plays with the red string of fate that sits on her wrist. Suddenly feeling warm, she reaches for the sleeve of her jacket but she pauses as she looks at her therapist. “Um, ma’am? Do you mind if I take this off? I won’t try anything. I promise,” she almost pleads.

Tzuyu has seen what happens on the news when mutants move a little too fast or are a little too unpredictable for a human’s liking. She’s seen the bad quality videos and pictures of her kind being beaten and killed by random pedestrians on the street, even by cops. She tries her best to stay as invisible as her mutation allows her to be, but it’s difficult when you’re not normal.

The therapist waves her off with a reassuring smile. “You’re fine, Tzuyu. Please, do anything that makes you feel comfortable. And you can call me Hani. You don’t have to be so formal with me. I’m not that old,” she politely adds.

Tzuyu undoes the velcro on the Marker on her arm, a black cloth band situated around the outermost article of a registered mutant’s clothing, and quickly wraps it around her left arm as soon as she takes off her jacket.

Mutants walk around with a black band on their outermost article of clothing, a symbol that lets humans know to steer clear of them. And if you’re caught without one, punishment will ensue.

“Shall we continue?” Hani asks.

Tzuyu nods her head.

“This Jung Hoseok you speak of,” Hani starts as reads from her notes. “How did you feel about him before you met him?”

“I was in love with him,” Tzuyu easily admits. “So blindly in love with someone who never even knew I existed.”

Hani crosses one leg over the other and looks at Tzuyu with a neutral but tender expression on her face. She doesn’t say anything, letting the mutant process their thoughts.

“Everyone loved him—well, they still love him since he’s still posting videos. He says he loves his fans so much, that he'll never take advantage of all the love and support he's been given.” Tzuyu pulls at the soft edges of the tissue and shrugs her shoulders before she continues. “So what happens when you meet the person you've given unconditional love and support to for _years_ —” 

She has to pause to keep herself from completely crumbling in front of a stranger. 

“I probably sound like a crazy fan, but he made himself so tangible. Like I knew him a little more at the end of every vlog. He was like a friend I could lean on when I was sad after a bad day. I built my hopes up so high that when I finally met him in person he was so below my expectations. I almost couldn't believe it... So how did he make me feel?” she wetly scoffs as she looks at her therapist. “Like I never meant anything to him. Even after he saw that we were soulmates at his fan meeting. I never meant anything to him.”

“I’m sure there are other people who think differently,” Hani tenderly comments as she scribbles down a few notes on her clipboard. 

When Tzuyu doesn't reply she changes the subject. She guesses the concept of friends is something they can touch on in another session.

“You're within a small percentage of the mutant community that presents a mutation that is the exact opposite of their partner. Care to tell me how you feel about that?”

Tzuyu wipes at her eyes one last time before she throws away the soiled paper into a nearby trash bin. “I think it’s cliche. Fire and ice. Seems like something fictional.

She stares down at her hands. The permanent frostbite that stains her fingertips will always be a reminder of how cold it was when she came into contact with her soulmate.

“Do you still have suicidal ideations?” Hani inquires.

“No,” Tzuyu shakes her head. “I don't get those thoughts anymore. Thoughts of not being here anymore... Although I'm better now, I just don't think I'll ever forget how cold it was that day... Or how cold he was.”

The therapist begins writing again. “Do you mind telling me how you two met?” She sets her pen down and looks up when the mutant is hesitant to answer. “Only if you feel comfortable. Remember, Tzuyu, you control how this session goes. I'm only asking questions to get you to open up.”

Tzuyu looks at the clock on the wall. It's a quarter till one in the afternoon. Snow begins to silently fall on the other side of the window. 

She has time. She closes her eyes and takes a deep breath. 

When she opens her eyes again, she's standing in an empty parking lot. Hoseok sits on the hood of his expensive car. The headlights are still on and the engine softly hums as it warms the butt of his thick pants. 

He runs his fingers through his hair out of frustration. His soulmate stands before him and he can visibly tell it’s taking everything within her not to cry. 

Hoseok looks to his left and spots his bodyguard standing near the back door of the hotel he just came out of. The bodyguard is giving the fated couple privacy but he's close enough to step in at any sign of trouble.

Tzuyu inhales shakily. The winter air burns her lungs and the tips of her fingers prickle at the bitter bite of the wind. 

The invisible string tying them together is pulling at every fiber of her being. She stands her ground even though her body is screaming for Hoseok’s touch. 

She looks over his expensive clothes. “You’re not wearing a Maker.”

“Shut up,” Hoseok hisses under his breath as he abruptly stands. He snaps his neck to his bodyguard to see if he can hear their conversation, and when the bodyguard remains as he is, Hoseok turns back to his soulmate. “Of course, I don’t wear a Marker. Do you know how many fans I’d lose if they knew I was a mutant? My views would go down overnight.”

“You’re more worried about numbers rather than your own safety?” Tzuyu asks incredulously. “You’re breaking a law. You could be killed for being a rogue.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Hoseok spits. He sighs as he sits back down on the hood of his car. “I shouldn’t have brought you out here. I should have just acted as if nothing happened.”

“You’re not even gonna give us a chance?” Tzuyu desperately asks. 

“We're two different kinds of people,” Hoseok flatly comments. “We’d never work out.”

Deep down, Tzuyu knows Hoseok is right, especially because he’s a mutant and she’s a human, which could make their potential relationship taboo according to society, but she wants to try. She’s willing to push the boundary.

“People wait their whole lives to meet their soulmate,” Tzuyu argues weakly. She has waited for this moment since she was a little girl.

“Too bad I’m not one of those people.” 

Tzuyu balks at that, too stunned to say anything in return.

Hoseok’s eyes gloss over Tzuyu’s dated outfit and he scoffs arrogantly. “You could’ve at least dressed a little nicer for my fan meeting. This isn’t some kind of charity event.”

Hoseok knows he’s being harsh. He wants nothing more than to nip this conversation in the bud and go home. He knows he’s going to be spending the rest of his day mending the mistake of cutting his event short.

Releasing official statements clearing his actions are nothing new for him. His fans will forgive him, he’ll post another vlog, he’ll pick up another sponsor deal, and the fame and recognition will get to his head and inflate an ego he can’t seem to get rid of. The cycle is endless.

Tzuyu, feeling embarrassed and ridiculed, pulls her duffle coat tighter around her slight frame. She feels ashamed. Her gut told her to come here, so she can only blame herself.

Everything was fine until Hoseok took her hands within his warm grasp after he autographed a ripped piece of magazine paper with his smiling face on it. Tzuyu’s red string of fate burned through her skin when they made contact, leaving an angry, welted ring on her wrist. Her arm faintly throbs, but she tries her best to ignore it.

Hoseok looks at her as if he’s bored. “So how much do you want?” he mutters as he reaches into his pocket for his wallet. “I’m sure you want money in exchange for keeping what happened today a secret.”

He’s putting up a front. His heart is racing through his chest right now, but he'll never admit it. He never intended to meet his soulmate like this. 

Hoseok imagined things a whole lot more different than this. Different as in them accidentally bumping into each other at a convenience store, or finding each other in a crowded room, years from now. 

Tzuyu’s appearance fills him with doubt. Sure, his next vlog could be titled I Met My Soulmate and She’s A Mutant *NOT CLICKBAIT* and it could garner a few million views alongside the revenue from companies lined up to sponsor him, but Hoseok doesn't have the emotional capacity to actually care about someone just yet. 

So he does what he knows best: he denies his feelings. He denies their bond.

“What a waste of time,” Tzuyu shakes her head in disbelief. “I don’t want anything from a coward like you,” she spits.

A burst of rage fills Hoseok’s veins and his eyes hold the glint of a flame as Tzuyu walks away from him, but he quickly bites it down. No one calls him a coward. 

“Whatever,” he mutters under his breath. He slides into his car and slams the door to his car shut.

Hoseok glares at the purple scar just beneath the red string on his wrist that sits on his tanned skin. He snaps his fingers, sparking a small candle-like flame on his forefinger, and he uses it to slowly warm the cold ring around his wrist until his skin is back to its normal temperature. 

He gets a notification on his phone telling him to leave the premises before the paparazzi have a chance to swarm him. With a tired sigh leaving his lips, he drives home.

Tzuyu wraps her arms around herself as she walks home. The steep incline of the bridge she's climbing is starting to burn her calves. 

She slips on a bit of ice but she recovers as she catches the sight of Hoseok’s car speeding by. She rolls her eyes and brushes her long hair out of her face as she continues. 

Something scratches deep within her chest and she starts to cough. She grabs onto the bridge’s railing with one hand while the other covers her mouth as she catches an innocent sunflower petal tainted with dark spots of blood. 

Her eyes grow wide. She didn’t think she’d start showing symptoms of Hanahaki disease this quickly.

Tzuyu yanks her phone out of her purse to call her mom. She frantically scrolls through her contacts before her thumbs stop and hover the screen. 

What can Tzuyu say, that her mom was right? That she has minutes or hours—days if she’s lucky—before she dies from a requited love? 

She slips her phone back into her purse and keeps walking. She can barely see past the tears welling in her eyes. She's at the climax of the bridge when she can’t contain the cry ripping through her throat. 

What was she thinking of seeing Hoseok? What would a mutant want with a mere human like her? 

Hoseok has the power of the sun coursing through his entire being and she’s just a fragile sack of flesh living paycheck to paycheck.

Tzuyu coughs out a few more petals. She doesn’t even bother trying to catch the yellow petals or wipe away the dribble of blood trailing down her chin as she drops her belongings and climbs the railing. She wheezes as the tips of her shoes hang over the ledge. 

It’s eerily quiet as snow silently begins to fall. Thirty feet below, the surface of the river is frozen over. Tzuyu smiles at the memory of her ice skating over a frozen lake near her home. That was before she had to worry about college, money, bills, and finding her soulmate.

Tzuyu regrets waking up on her eighteenth birthday with a red string of fate wrapped around her wrist, she regrets meeting Hoseok, and, reluctantly, she regrets jumping into the freezing unknown at the very last second. 

Ice instantly breaks through the superficial layer of her skin and it ripples through her veins. Her body gets swept up by the frosty current before her body floats up to the icy barrier of the river. She beats her fists against the glass-like boundary separating her from the land of the living as she's carried downstream. 

Wisps of blood dance in the water as she scratches at the ice, trying to find some kind of leverage. Tzuyu fights to stay alive as water begins to fill her lungs. Her heart stops beating by the time the hole she left in the ice freezes over as if nothing happened.

Hoseok wakes up later that night covered in sweat. 

He hisses in pain as his red string stings his skin at a subzero temperature. He suddenly sets his whole arm aflame, engulfing the seemingly innocent tendril on fire. 

A few of his pillows and the sheets lying on his lap char at the sudden heat, but Hoseok doesn’t care. The fire dies down as quickly as it started and he checks his wrist again, only to be met with the sight of the string taking no damage. 

Hoseok’s blood begins to literally boil under his skin. 

He shuffles into the shower to try to cool down, but the cold water evaporates as soon as it hits his skin. He steps out of the shower still just as heated as the surface of the sun. His mind grows hazy as he fumbles his limbs through his flame-resistant clothes. 

Overcome with a sudden pang of dizziness, Hoseok trips over his feet and falls to the floor as he attempts to reach for his phone lying on the bedside table. 

His fingers grip the edge of it before he manages to grab his phone and he dials an emergency contact. The metal begins to slowly melt in his hand as he holds the receiver against his sweaty face. 

“H-Help,” Hoseok chokes out.

"Hoseok? Hello? What’s going on?" says a voice through the speaker. 

Hoseok losses consciousness before he can explain what is happening to him. He violently shivers as he rolls onto his back. 

For the first time in years, he feels cold.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Lemme know what you think, I am very appreciative of feedback.
> 
> See you in the next chapter ~


	3. The First Episode

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Don't be kind to everyone, Jungkook-ah. Not everyone is going to be kind to you.”

* * *

**EPISODE 1: Living In A Simulation**

* * *

_“C’mere,” Yoongi sleepily sighs, prompting Jungkook to climb into his bed. He runs his fingers through Jungkook’s soft hair as he closes his eyes. "You know I'll always be there for you, right?"_

_Jungkook gives a small smile as he presses himself more than he already possibly can into Yoongi’s warmth. “You promise?”_

_"Yeah, I promise,” Yoongi gently assures him. “We’re brothers, Kook-ah. No one can ever take that away from us."_

Hani lightly taps on the edge of her clipboard to get Jungkook's attention. She smiles tenderly when Jungkook looks her way. “Where did you go just now, Jungkook?”

Jungkook looks at his lap as he picks at his broken fingernails. A recent habit he's recently picked up. “He made a lot of promises.”

The therapist’s eyebrows slightly pull together. “He?”

“Yoongi,” Jungkook quietly clarifies. “My brother. My, uh, late brother.”

“Biological?”

Jungkook shakes his head. “No,” is all he says. An unanticipated tear slips down his cheek and he quickly wipes it away. 

Yoongi was a brother Jungkook never had, a semi-father figure that he could lean on as a small child, but things changed when he least expected it the most. He never expected Yoongi to die. He thought they’d be together forever. Yoongi promised him that.

Jungkook can still feel the phantom weight of Yoongi’s body in his arms. It rained so much that night and—

“How long has it been?” Hani asks, pulling him from his thoughts.

Jungkook glances at the small Christmas tree in the corner of the room. “It's been a year now.”

“Do you mind sharing with me how you felt then and how you feel now considering all that has happened?”

Jungkook's doe-like eyes grow wide. “You wanna know how Yoongi felt?”

Hani puts down her pen, she clasps her hands over her clipboard and sympathetically grins at Jungkook. She can tell Jungkook has a difficult time taking his own feelings into consideration. 

“How about we circle back to that question later, hm?” She pulls a folder full of Jungkook's records out from under the clipboard and opens it as she puts on a pair of spectacles. “Mirror-touch Synesthesia,” she reads before she looks back up at Jungkook. “Can you tell me more about your condition?”

“I was diagnosed with it when I was younger. It started out innocent. I’d see a couple kiss from across the room and feel the sensation on my own lips.” Jungkook absently rubs at his knuckles. “It got worse when my mutation presented itself a few years ago. If I saw someone in pain I’d feel every bit of it. My mutation also lets me experience someone else’s emotions if I touch them. All of my senses are heightened as well,” he adds.

“Have you ever come close to surging?” Hani carefully asks.

Surging is a controversial topic as of late. Mutants losing control of their powers and creating craters as big as cities, as a result, isn’t something that’s taken lightly. The fear of a mutant randomly exploding is a scary thought the lingers in the back of every human’s mind.

Jungkook takes a deep inhale through his nose. “No.” 

And it’s the truth, but Jungkook doesn't want to admit the countless times Yoongi has had to help him through his panic attacks. He doesn’t want to admit how much he wants to overdose on his medication just to feel normal.

Hani thoughtfully nods her head as she continues to read further into Jungkook's past. “You were a student at the Institute?” she asks. Jungkook doesn't even have to touch her to know that she pities him. “That must have been a difficult time.”

Jungkook shifts in his seat. “Doing as I was told was easy. I can't say the same for the simulations.”

“Simulations?”

“Our evaluations—or Sims, is what we called them,” Jungkook explains. “They were performance-based tests to show if we can apply what we were taught in class to real-life situations.”

The therapist leans forward in her chair with interest. “Can you tell me about them, these Sims?”

The hairs on the back of Jungkook's neck stand tall as the winter air harshly blows outside. He listens to the whistles coming from the cracked window pane, to the steady breaths of the therapists, and to the clock on the wall across the room. 

Jungkook tunes out every sound until all he can hear is the distant ticks coming from the hands of the clock. He closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. 

When he opens them again, he's standing in a room full of clocks. He takes in his surroundings and all he can see is clocks—mechanical, digital, spring-driven. 

_Tick, tick, tick._

Every second that goes by amplifies in Jungkook’s sensitive ears. The grandfather clock to his left sings at the midnight mark, and suddenly every clock in the room begins to loudly chime, catching Jungkook off guard. 

Jungkook covers his ears in an attempt to muffle the noise. He spots a door on the other side of the room and he pushes through it to escape, only to find himself in the same exact room, except this time the clocks are replaced with artillery. A plethora of ammunition, guns, large blades, daggers. and grenades line all four walls. 

He moves to the weapons he's most familiar with. He arms himself with two katanas, twin pistols, and a few smoke grenades just in case things get tight. 

Jungkook slips on the same uniform he wears in every simulation: a dark, paneled leather military jacket that buttons all the way up to his chin with a pair of well-fitting pants to match, fingerless gloves, military-grade boots, and a holster that wraps around his shoulders and crisscrosses over his back to hold his katanas along with two gun holsters that wrap around his thighs.

Jungkook is loading a pistol when the door behind him begins to open. In one swift movement, he spins on his heels as he pulls back on the barrel of the gun to fill its chamber with a golden bullet. His thumb pulls back on the hammer and he places his finger on the trigger as Yoongi puts up his hands in defense.

“Kook-ah,” Yoongi says with a bit of surprise lacing his voice.

Jungkook’s eyebrows pull together before they relax and a small smile forms on his lips. He quickly lowers his gun. “Hyung.”

Yoongi is dressed similarly to Jungkook, only his jacket is cropped just above his hips where a utility belt is holding two pistols, a loose bandana hangs from his neck, and the leather hugging his built frame is a shade of black the human eye can’t fully process.

“I guess we’re doing this simulation together,” Yoongi comments as he lowers his hands and grins. “You need a haircut.”

Jungkook snorts. “Says the guy with a man-bun.”

“At least I have enough common sense to keep my hair out of my eyes,” Yoongi playfully counters.

“ _Jeon Jungkook. Identification number 097. Min Yoongi. Identification number 093,_ ” a robotic voice says over the intercom. _“Welcome to your ninth evaluation, Jeon Jungkook. Assignment: Retrieve a stolen document. Take down all enemies. Target: Han Soojoon.”_

Yoongi moves to the wall holding ammunition and he grabs a few magazines to store in his belt. “How do you wanna play this? Stealth or all-in?”

They don’t know how deadly this Han Soojoon guy is or how many men he has working under him. If Jungkook were by himself in this Sim he’d tip-toe his way through the mission, but since Yoongi is here, he says, “A little bit of both?”

On the opposite side of the room, a door cracks itself open as if it’s telling Jungkook and Yoongi to get on with their assignment.

“Ladies first,” Yoongi jokes as he politely gestures to the door.

“Shut up, hyung,” Jungkook groans.

Jungkook leads the duo as he carefully pushes through the door. Yoongi closes it behind them as the darkness of the night covers them. A few yards away stands a fenced-in warehouse guarded by a handful of men. 

Jungkook and Yoongi find cover behind a small abandoned storage unit before a bright spotlight from the warehouse touches them.

“I’ll shoot down the snipers,” Yoongi says, as he attaches a silencer to his gun. He peeks his head around the corner before he turns back to Jungkook. “Be my eyes?”

Jungkook stands close behind the elder and places a hand on his shoulder, becoming one with Yoongi’s senses. He can feel every fiber of the elder’s being, but a phantom wave of nervousness fills his belly, which leads him to whisper, “Are you nervous?”

Yoongi glances back at Jungkook before he returns to his sights to his scope. “What the hell? No,” he whispers back.

“Hyung, I can literally hear your heart beating through your chest.”

“And your breath smells like chips,” Yoongi argues back. “I would like for you to help me guide my gun, not puff hot air into my ear, Jungkook.”

“Sorry,” Jungkook quietly apologizes. He can’t help that Fritos and chili cheese hotdogs are his go-to comfort foods before his evaluations. He peeks over Yoongi’s ear and his enhanced vision helps him find the first sniper. “One o’clock, fourth floor.”

Yoongi’s shoulders slightly kick back as he squeezes the trigger. He sends a silver bullet right through the enemy's skull.

The beginnings of a headache gnaw at Jungkook’s temples, but he shakes it off. “Alright. Second one. Nine o'clock on the third floor.”

Another muted gunshot sends a bullet right between the eyes of the next enemy. Jungkook quietly groans and rests his head on Yoongi’s shoulder. A dull pang of pain cracks straight through his skull. 

Maybe he should close his eyes right before Yoongi shoots.

“Sorry, Jungkookie,” Yoongi apologizes with tense shoulders. “I think there’s one more. You okay?” Yoongi asks.

Jungkook can feel a wave of guilt entering his mind. “Yeah, I’m good. It’s okay. Two o’clock. Second floor.”

Yoongi shoots and Jungkook closes his eyes just before the bullet makes contact with the enemy’s skin.

“Three headshots,” Yoongi says as he steps back into the shadow of the building. He makes a big show of blowing the smoke off the muzzle of his gun. “They don’t call me a sharpshooter for nothing,” he smirks.

“I think you need glasses, hyung. You were kinda off on your first shot,” Jungkook teases.

“My eyesight is just fine. Your eyes are just bigger than mine, so you can see more. I’m just showing my appreciation for your big eyes by asking you for help,” Yoongi reasons.

“Yeah, totally not because I’m a mutant with superpowers,” Jungkook says sarcastically.

“Definitely not because of that,” Yoongi agrees with slyly.

Jungkook’s ears pull back at a sudden presence lurking behind him. A man with a rifle yells as he begins to shoot at them, which alerts the other hostiles in the area. Jungkook uses his body to shield Yoongi as he takes a few bullets to the chest. 

He grits his teeth as he reaches for a dagger attached to his posterior holster and he throws it. The blade ripples through the air at an alarming speed before it finds a home in an enemy’s neck. The man scratches at his throat as blood spurts out of his jugular vein. 

Jungkook’s eyes grow wide as realizes what he’s just done. Pain radiates throughout his neck and he clasps his hands around his throat to try to dull the sting. 

He didn’t mean to kill him. He never wants to kill anyone. He’s gone through most of his Sims without killing. He’d rather render his enemies speechless then hear the absence of a heartbeat, but things are different when it comes to Yoongi. 

Jungkook always finds a way to spare mercy to anyone, even the unkind. Always. 

Jungkook’s breathing starts to pick up as the corners of his vision start to bleed red. A few bullets ring over his head before he’s yanked by his elbow.

“Jungkook!” Yoongi yells as he reloads his gun. “Snap out of it! Are you okay?"

Jungkook rips his eyes from the dead body and he shakes his head as his vision goes back to normal. “I’m fine.”

Yoongi can tell something is wrong, but he doesn’t pry. Not yet, at least. “We got three enemies on the ground and two in the watchtower. Take your pick.”

“Watchtower.”

Jungkook and Yoongi charge full force for the warehouse. Yoongi falls on his back, avoiding a spray of bullets as he slides against the gravel, and he shoots down the men standing at the fence’s gate as Jungkook runs ahead of him. He climbs up the watchtower with calculated ease and he pulls himself through the window only to be met with two men jumping him on sight.

A thick fist aims for Jungkook’s face but he easily dodges it before grabbing the man’s arm and pulling it towards him. Jungkook strikes the heel of his boot across the man’s head just as he stumbles past Jungkook and his forehead smacks conveniently on the button that opens the gate down below for Yoongi. 

Jungkook spins around and he uses the palm of his hand to deaden the blow of the other man’s gun. Lacerated skin and broken bone stick out from Jungkook’s glove but he ignores the sting as he breaks the man’s wrist and takes the gun to shoot him in his foot. Jungkook makes use of the distraction to knock the man out cold with the butt of the gun.

Yoongi opens a door and enters the room. His eyes quickly fall to Jungkook’s injured hand. “You good?”

Jungkook lifts his hand to find it already healing. Loose nerves and hanging veins pull themselves back together before new flesh covers it as if nothing happened.

He clicks his tongue in annoyance at the frayed bullet hole in his glove. “Yeah, I’m good.”

Jungkook and Yoongi run across a bridge that connects the watchtower to the warehouse. Yoongi presses a worn plastic button next to an elevator when they reach the end of the bridge. They check their surroundings before they enter it. 

The doors shut soon after and the white noise filling the cabin rings in Jungkook’s ears.

Yoongi presses the button for the fourth floor. “Talk to me,” he suddenly says, his voice full of concern.

Jungkook bites his lip as the cabin begins to slowly ascend. “You know how I told you about the last Sim? How I had to torture that guy to get information out of him,” he starts. 

He can still feel the weight of the pliers he held in his hand, the sting beneath his nails. Jungkook could feel every visible wound he inflicted on the man. 

“All I could see was red... I had to look away when my partner brought out the chainsaw.”

Yoongi crosses his arms over his chest. “Did you tell Professor Yi?”

“He’s the one that cut the Sim short when I fainted. He had Chaeyoung run my blood work when I finally stopped shaking enough for her to get a needle in... I thought I was still in the Sim.” Jungkook stares down at his hands. “It’s scary sometimes, hyung. It’s like I can feel myself losing control when I can’t handle the pain. It’s easier to turn a blind eye or not kill at all.”

Yoongi undoes the bandana from around his neck and ties it around Jungkook's head. “Then when you do have to kill, turn a blind eye.”

Jungkook touches the soft material covering his eyes. “Hyung—”

Yoongi tightens the knot before he steps away. “Just trust me. Use your other senses. Don’t rely on your sight.”

The elevator dings and comes to stop on the fourth floor. Jungkook lowers his head and he listens. 

He can hear multiple heartbeats just outside the elevator. He can hear guns cocking as a few pairs of heavy footsteps shuffle across the floor. In his bubble of darkness, Jungkook reaches back and pulls unsheathes his katanas just as the doors open.

Bullets fly through the air without hesitation and Jungkook slowly walks forward, whirling his blades in every direction over his body to ricochet them back to his enemies. He keeps walking as he hears bodies fall to the ground. 

A gunshot rings from behind Jungkook and he guesses Yoongi killed someone Jungkook missed. The onslaught of ammunition stops momentarily and Jungkook briefly pauses to listen again. 

Three heartbeats. Two rifles. 

Jungkook runs forward as the men are still reloading their guns. Jungkook skids across the floor on his knees before he crosses his katanas in front of him. He grits his teeth at the smooth slide of his blades slicing through flesh, muscle, and bone. The bodies fall to the floor with a wet thud.

Jungkook rises and takes off the bandana. His eyes lock with a distraught but angry man sitting at a polished wooden desk. “You must be Han Soojoon,” he inquires.

Soojoon shakes with anger as he rises from his seat. “You killed all my men!”

Jungkook wastes no time getting straight to the point. “Where’s the document?”

“Whatever you’re asking for, I don’t have it.”

“Bullshit,” Yoongi says. He stands a few feet behind Jungkook with his pistol aimed for Soojoon’s head. He jerks his head in the direction of the vault on the other side of the room. “Get up. Walk over to the vault and open it.”

The elevator dings again. Jungkook and Yoongi turn towards the sound.

Jungkook clenches his jaw and turns back to Soojoon. “Who is that? Who's coming up here?”

Soojoon nervously looks between the elevator and Jungkook. “No one!”

Yoongi moves to the elevator and presses his back against the wall next to it. Jungkook silently watches as the number above the elevator turns from three to four. 

Yoongi yields his other gun, probably thinking it's another group of men, but Jungkook only hears one heartbeat. The elevator softly dings again as the doors slide open. 

A woman holding a tray of teacups emerges from the cabin. Her eyes lock on Jungkook instantly. “Honey?” she gasps.

Yoongi is quick to round the corner and grab her. The tray falls to the floor. Dark liquid and broken porcelain scatter across the floor as Yoongi wraps an arm around the screaming woman.

“Jiwoo!” Soojoon yells.

Yoongi cocks his gun, causing the woman’s legs to buckle. “Shut up.” He smirks at Soojoon as he places the gun’s barrel against Jiwoo’s head. “Looks like you have some incentive now.” 

Soojoon ambles over to the vault and Jungkook follows close behind him. The only thing Jungkook wants to do is obtain whatever Soojoon stole and get the hell out of this Sim.

Soojoon’s fingers hover over the electronic keypad for a moment too long before Yoongi loses his patience. He aims the gun at him. Jungkook can sense the tension in the air rising. 

Just as Soojoon opens the vault, Jiwoo pulls a small knife from under her dress. She stabs Yoongi in the thigh and he drops his gun as he grunts in pain. She grabs Yoongi's gun from his holster as he falls and she shoots Jungkook in his shoulder before he can disarm her.

Jungkook ignores the pain as he grabs Jiwoo and harshly pins her against the wall. Soojoon runs towards Jungkook with a knife of his own, but he suddenly slumps to the floor when blood splatters from his head. Smoke billows from the barrel of Yoongi’s gun from his crouched position on the floor. 

The elder doesn’t hesitate to pull the trigger on Jiwoo. Blood sprays over Jungkook’s face and his head spins, filling with a wave of pain he wasn’t expecting. Bile rises in the back of his throat as Yoongi limps into the vault and staggers back out with a black briefcase. 

“Mission complete,” Yoongi grits.

Just as Jungkook thinks the Sim is over, the hairs in the back of his neck stand tall. He can sense another presence in the room but he can’t pinpoint where it is.

Yoongi is suddenly punched across the face and he grabs his pained cheek as he stares questionably at Jungkook. Not even a second later, he’s thrown to the floor and handprints cover Yoongi’s neck as he begins to struggle for air. 

A translucent, white silhouette appears and sends two violent blows across Yoongi’s jaw before it disappears. His lip is busted and a nasty bruise is growing on his cheek.

“There's another mutant in the Sim,” Yoongi croaks.

Jungkook goes on high alert as he unsheathes his katanas. His ears perk up at the sound of buzzing, almost as if a bee is flying around the room. The white silhouette appears and goes for Yoongi again, this time with a gun, and Jungkook uses his body to guard his brother as he slices his blades through the air, but the ominous figure disappears again.

Whatever mutant this is, it’s not stopping until it gets the briefcase.

“Get in the vault,” Jungkook sternly instructs.

Yoongi staggers to his feet and runs the best as he can with the suitcase in hand towards the vault before he closes it. Jungkook is met with silence before the figure appears again.

Like a ghost, they run straight through Jungkook’s body before they grab his hair and yank down. Jungkook sees stars as his head meets the ground. His katanas and his pistols disappear from his body, and he quickly stands and readies himself with his fists in the air.

Bullets spray through the air before the figure appears once more and Jungkook grows more and more alert as bullets find their way through his skin. Jungkook throws a dagger and the gun falls out of the enemy’s hand as the blade slices through their wrist.

Growing angry, the figure clotheslines Jungkook and sends them both to the floor. They wrestle against each other and Jungkook gets the upper hand just as he lands a heavy punch across the enemy’s face. The figure disappears again before he can retaliate any further. 

Jungkook rolls back on his feet and he hears that buzzing sound again in his left ear. He grabs the air behind his head and he successfully throws the figure over his shoulder and onto the floor.

The figure kicks at Jungkook, but he dodges it, grabbing their ankle and throwing them across the room. Jungkook swipes the gun on the floor and aims at the figure, but they are nowhere to be seen.

Jungkook breathes steadily as he listens for any sign of the figure. He hears something wet dropping on the floor. Only his eyes move as he follows a trail of blood forming on the floor to his right. He quickly turns to the shoot, but the figure suddenly appears and grabs his hands. 

They both struggle over the weapon as Jungkook tastes desperation on his tongue. The figure tries its best to fight against Jungkook, and Jungkook grits his teeth as the gun is slowly turning on him. He pushes against it, trying his best to win in this game of strength.

Jungkook is suddenly overcome with complex emotions varying from anger to sadness. His movements falter as he questions his enemy’s intentions in this Sim, but he keeps on as sweat drips down his neck.

The figure is a partially invisible silhouette, but Jungkook can make out their form as he pushes the head of the gun beneath their chin. The only thing on his mind is saving Yoongi from danger. Although he doesn't want to, he pulls the trigger.

Lightning strikes through Jungkook’s brain as the bullet flies through the ceiling. Pain blossoms like a flower through his head as his vision goes red. The cloaked figure grows fully visible as they fall at Jungkook's feet.

Jungkook chokes on his own spit, he staggers back and lands on his butt all the while keeping a vice-like grip on the gun. The red fog clouding his vision and the adrenaline pumping through his veins is all he can feel. His hands shake as anger, desperation, fear, and malice swirl at the back of his mind.

Jungkook drops the gun and he covers his ears as his head begins to ache with a severity he’s never felt before. The heavy footsteps rushing towards him sound like loud gongs. His head is pounding and a bit of blood drips from his nose. 

“Those emotions aren't mine. They're not mine. I-It's just a dream. It's just a Sim,” Jungkook mumbles, trying to calm himself down. “Just a dream, just a Sim, _it's just a Sim_ —”

Yoongi kneels on his good leg and he carefully pries Jungkook's trembling fingers away. “Hey, hey, hey. Jungkook-ah,” he shushes him. He eyes the blood on Jungkook’s clothes. “Are you hurt?” 

The nimble shake of Jungkook's head cues him to begin to run his fingers over Jungkook’s body. He tugs at the younger’s clothes and checks over his skin before he finds multiple bullets slowly emerging from Jungkook’s flesh. 

Jungkook is lucky he can heal so easily. As for Yoongi—

“Almost shot you,” Jungkook slurs. His eyes snap over to the cloaked figure as blood begins to pool around their body. “Shit,” Jungkook yells in frustration. He’s just on the brink of a panic attack. “Had to do something or—”

“Or nothing, Jungkook. You gotta calm down before you surge,” Yoongi calmly interrupts him.

A group of medics pushes into the room, but they keep their distance when Yoongi says he has control of the situation. 

Other mutants at the Institute have lost control of their powers during Sims in the past. Overstimulation is a major factor of death if left untreated. Yoongi won’t Jungkook become a bloody crater left in the ground.

“C’mon. Breathe, Kook-ah.” Yoongi places his hands on Jungkook’s shoulders and squeezes them to get his attention. “You gotta breathe with me.”

Jungkook eventually begins to follow the slow rise and fall of Yoongi. The red fades away, his emotions calm down, but uncertainty lingers at the forefront of his mind. “Are you hurt?”

“I’m okay,” he gestures at his obviously harmed body. “Yeah, I got a few scratches, but—”

“You look like you got run over by a car,” Jungkook argues defensively. 

His eyes flutter down to the growing bruises on Yoongi's neck. The sight of Yoongi being thrown around and strangled like a ragdoll isn't something Jungkook can easily shake from his mind.

“But I’m fine,” Yoongi reiterates.

_“Test nine is complete,”_ a robotic voice announces overhead.

The lights suddenly cut out. The dead bodies of Soojoon’s men disappear as if they were never there, the tile beneath them turns into polished concrete, the walls begin to glitch and fade away, and Jungkook’s bloody clothes morph into a white bodysuit. 

A slow round of applause echoes through the large room as light footsteps make their way towards the boys. 

Goosebumps travel over Jungkook's body. 

"Congratulations, Jeon Jungkook. You just completed your evaluation," Jungsuk says earnestly. "We weren't expecting you to let Yoongi do most of the work in this scenario, but nonetheless, you completed the task you were assigned." His dark eyes wander between the two boys with a bit of amusement before he looks down at his clipboard and begins to write. 

Jungkook follows the pen in the elder's hand with furrowed eyebrows. "Did I do something wrong, sir?"

"Don’t get me wrong, the teamwork presented between you two is very admirable, but you hesitated too much which led to Yoongi carrying you. I'm also docking points for showing emotion," Jungsuk monotonically explains as he taps his pen against the clipboard. 

The group of medics moves to dispose of the mutant Jungkook killed. Jungkook tries not to get angry again as he watches them carry away the body in a stretcher.

"You let the situation get to you because you were cornered into saving someone very close to you,” Jungsuk continues. “Min Yoongi killed most of your enemies for you because you have some strange complex about taking someone else’s life although you are currently being trained to become an assassin. You may have passed the evaluation, but it was done in an imprudent manner."

Jungkook grinds his teeth. He never chose to be trained as an assassin. The Institute _voluntold_ him to do it.

Yoongi rises to his feet with an audible wince leaving his lips. The effects of the Sim still cover his body as a wet, red patch has formed underneath his SimSuit. His thigh is going to need stitches. 

"C’mon. Give him a break," he scoffs.

"He's come too far to be given a break," Jungsuk counters. "Remember, you still have two evaluations left, Min Yoongi. I'd save the unnecessary feedback if I were you."

Yoongi silently averts his eyes back to Jungkook. "Let's go."

Jungkook's body is still shaking as he tugs Yoongi into his side to help him walk. He wants to know whoever's idea it was to put Yoongi in one of his more dangerous simulations, but he decides against voicing it.

"Actually, I'd like to see you in my office, Min Yoongi," Jungsuk suddenly says.

Jungkook and Yoongi stop walking like a pair of deer caught in headlights. Although Jungkook can't see it, he can literally feel the smirk Jungsuk is wearing.

"Yes, sir," is all Yoongi says before they exit the room.

“What do you think he wants?” Jungkooks asks as soon as the doors close behind them.

Yoongi shakes his head as he rubs at the tense muscles in the back of his neck. “No idea. Probably wants to use me as a target at the shooting range again.”

Jungkook can sense Yoongi’s tightness not only in his voice but also in his body language as they continue to walk. Jungkook thinks Yoongi has been moody lately and he understands. 

They're both so close to escaping the crooked hands of the Institute, and if they prove their worth as assassins they'll be free people able to live out in the real world. But they need to be good for the time being.

“Hyung, you can't keep talking back like that," Jungkook reprimands him.

“I know, I know.” Yoongi waves him off as they enter his room. He lies down on his bed with a tired sigh. “I just… I feel so useless in the Sims. I can't sense what's coming next as you do. It's like I'm nothing compared to you. That guy came out of nowhere and the next thing I know I’m hiding in another room because I’m human.”

“You're not useless,” Jungkook says. Although Yoongi isn't a mutant like him, he'll never think any less of his hyung. 

Yoongi says nothing in return. He just stares up at the ceiling because he knows they'll end up arguing over why the Institute chose them to be a part of their experiments for the umpteenth time. 

Yoongi suddenly stands and begins to unzip the back of his bodysuit. “I'm gonna change and go see what Jungsuk wants. I'll catch you at dinner, okay?”

“Okay,” Jungkook quietly parrots. 

He wishes he could touch Yoongi and feel what he's going through, but he chooses to leave the room to give the elder space instead. 

  
  
  
  
  


“Did you two argue a lot?” the Hani asks, breaking Jungkook from his thoughts.

“We had disagreements here and there. We always solved them pretty quickly,” Jungkook answers. “But our disagreements turned into arguments after Yoongi’s eighth test.”

Jungkook remembers it like it was yesterday. He's doing homework on Yoongi’s bed when the elder limps into the room. 

Yoongi’s face is covered in bruises and there's a bloody gash above his right eyebrow. Jungkook is quick to help the elder onto his sofa. Yoongi curses under his breath as he peels his SimSuit from his bruised shoulders. 

Jungkook pulls the sleeves from Yoongi's arms to reveal his battered torso. “What the hell, hyung! What happened to you?”

Yoongi weakly smirks. “You should see the other guy.”

“Stop joking around.” Jungkook’s hands ball into tight fists as he tries to control his anger. He suddenly rises to his feet. “This is serious. I'm gonna get someone—”

Yoongi stops the younger male before he's out of reach. “Don’t, Jungkook-ah,” he wearily sighs. His face scrunches with pain as he lies on his back and that sends Jungkook into a deeper hole of worry.

“You didn't request a nurse after your Sim?” Jungkook asks as he reaches for Yoongi’s hand. He stares at dried blood beneath Yoongi’s broken fingernails.

“No. Why bother?” Yoongi says. “Mutants come first remember?”

Anger, sadness, and envy swirl in the back of Jungkook's mind before Yoongi drops his hand. “You're jealous,” he says without thinking. 

Guilt and pain race over Yoongi’s face before he covers it up with a stoic expression. “It's nothing new,” he says as he crosses his arms over his chest. “I get treated like shit here while you get put on a pedestal.”

“That's not true,” Jungkook says defensively.

“You fucking know it is, Jungkook. Don't stand there and tell me you'd be used as a punching bag in someone else's Sim,” Yoongi argues.

Jungkook's lack of response supplies Yoongi with an answer. 

“You're just like the rest of them. You walk into the room with your chest puffed out like you mean something. News flash, Jungkook, you don't. You were shoved from house to house because no one cares about you. You ended up here because no one cares about you. Your birth parents were scared of you, but you think Jungsuk or the Institute cares about you? You're only a number to them and that's all you'll ever be.”

Jungkook clenches his jaw along with his fists. He tries to tell himself that Yoongi doesn't mean what he's saying, but he can tell that Yoongi’s words are coming from a place of hurt.

“God, Jungkook, I wake up every day mentally preparing myself for shit you or the other mutants don't have to deal with. We, humans, fear for our lives in every Sim, but I have to listen to you happily talk about how you had so much fun using your powers. _I didn't know, Yoongi hyung_ ,” Yoongi says in a mock-Jungkook voice. “Well, now you know,” he tiredly huffs. “I envy you. You never have to worry about bruises or scars. You never have to carry memories on your skin.”

“It's not easy for me either,” Jungkook says angrily. “I may not carry the past on my skin but my memories are just as vivid, and I remember very clearly telling you to never talk about my parents,” he spits. “You think I like being like this? Every family that took me in ended up trying to kill me before social services had to step in every damn time.” 

Jungkook rapidly blinks his eyes, trying to keep the tears threatening to spill over at bay. He’s long overdue for a good cry. 

“A shotgun to the face. A knife straight through the heart. Getting pushed down the stairs by a foster brother that hated me for no reason and breaking my neck,” he chokes out. “But I— _we_ have to be kind to every human we encounter because everyone is scared of us, hyung.”

Yoongi clenches his jaw as Jungkook's heavy breathing fills the quiet room. The unspoken trials they both suffer don't go unnoticed.

“I wish they would've killed me in that Sim today. I was pretty close to knocking on death’s front door anyway. I heard if you die in a Sim you don't feel any pain. I wouldn't mind going out like that.” Yoongi bitterly laughs. “Jungsuk cut the Sim short. I could barely stand on my own two feet but he had the audacity to tell me to say thank you for saving me.” 

He meets Jungkook's eyes as he blinks away a few tears. 

“Don't be kind to everyone, Jungkook-ah. Not everyone is going to be kind to you.”

Jungkook breathes in through his nose as looks at his therapist. “He'd always apologize when things would get heated like that. But ever since that test it's almost like we were walking on thin ice around each other,” he tells the therapist.

“Did things ever go back to normal between you two?

Jungkook shakes his head. 

Hani takes off her glasses and puts away Jungkook's folder as she sits back in her chair. “I want you to close your eyes for me, okay? Unclench your fists and release all of the tension in your body.” 

She waits for Jungkook to relax in his seat before she continues. 

“If you can, I want you to think of the last time you were happy, whether it be with Yoongi or someone else. Think back to the last time you felt some kind of joy—even if it was just for a moment—before your brother's passing.”

Jungkook nods his head. He glances at the clock on the wall again. The session is almost over. He sinks a little more into the cushions, but before he can even close his eyes, someone bumps into him. A cluster of books falls to the floor and Jungkook quickly kneels down to gather them. 

He looks up at the girl squatting in front of him and smiles. “You know, this has become a weekly occurrence. I'm starting to think you're doing this on purpose now,” he teases.

Chaeyoung timidly smiles as her cheeks turn rosy. She takes her earphones out of her ears and stuffs them in her pocket before she rises to her feet. Jungkook carefully slips her books into her arms and she hugs them to her chest. “Hey, Jungkookie. Sorry about that.”

Jungkook can hear her heart beating in his ears. He’s lucky she can’t hear his “Where’re you headed to?”

“My room,” she gestures down the hall. “I was just studying in the library. Were you in Min Yoongi’s room?” she asks as she looks at Yoongi’s nameplate beside the door.

“Yeah,” Jungkook sighs. “He’s about to go to training so I was gonna wander around until dinner time. Do you need any help carrying all of that?” he says as he jerks his chin at Chaeyoung’s books. “The female wing is on the other side of the building.”

“Actually, yeah, that would be nice. Thank you.” Chaeyoung halves her load with Jungkook. She glances at Jungkook's SimSuit. “Sim training?”

Jungkook leans against the wall. He can hear Yoongi rustling through his clothes on the other side of the door. “Yeah. I’m pretty nervous, though. It’s my last test before they decide if I can leave.”

Chaeyoung’s face falls for a fraction of a second, but she quickly covers it with a tight grin. “That's good.”

Every fiber of Jungkook’s being wants to escape the Institute. No more needles or experiments. No more fear. No more pain. But a part of him wants to stay for Chaeyoung. Their relationship is a complicated one as they dance around their feelings for one another. Maybe in another life, they can be together. A life where a red string doesn’t dictate you can and can’t fall in love with.

“What about you?” Jungkook asks, trying to lighten the mood. “What's been going on in little Chae’s world?”

Chaeyoung playfully rolls her eyes with a light laugh. “The usual. Professor Yi keeps me busy in the lab. He’s so picky about everything I do.” 

Jungkook finds himself smiling along with her. Just as he's about to make more conversation with his crush, Yoongi opens the door. Surprise flashes across his face before his stoic expression returns as he looks between Jungkook and Chaeyoung.

“Son Chaeyoung,” Yoongi flatly greets.

Chaeyoung clutches her books against her chest as she politely bows to the elder. “Hello, Min Yoongi.”

Yoongi jerks his chin at Jungkook as a goodbye before he turns down the hall. Jungkook stares at Chaeyoung as she watches Yoongi go. Before Jungkook can question what's on her mind, she tells him what's on Yoongi's instead.

“He’s worried,” she says distantly.

“About?”

Chaeyoung looks at Jungkook with mirth. “One’s mind is never someone else's business to tell, Kookie. You know that.”

Jungkook glances over to catch the last of Yoongi as he turns the corner at the end of the hall. By next week, Yoongi will be stuck at the Institute while Jungkook is living his new life.

“He thinks a lot about you. That's all I'll say,” Chaeyoung says softly. She tilts her head inquisitively. “And you're worried about him, too, huh?”

Jungkook's eyes snap to Chaeyoung. “You promised you'd never read my mind.”

“I don't need to read your mind to tell when something's upsetting you. It's all in your body language,” she gently explains. “Don’t worry. Your thoughts are safe. Can’t say the same for my roommate, though. She thinks about eating japchae 24/7,” she jokes.

Jungkook relaxes at that. “Let’s go.”

They drop off Chaeyoung’s books in her room. She takes the books from Jungkook and sets them on her desk before she steps out into the hallway and closes the door. She leans against it and looks up at Jungkook. “I’d ask you to come in but Momo’s in there.”

“That’s fine. I’ll see you at dinner,” Jungkook says easily. He tries not to show his disappointment. He really wanted to decompress and listen to Chaeyoung’s playlists. Just as he’s about to step away, Chaeyoung grabs his wrist. Nervousness bubbles at the back of his mind.

“We can hang out somewhere else,” she tells him. “I know a place.”

Before Jungkook can question Chaeyoung, she pulls him down the hall and through a few corridors before they end up at a dead end. A door to a storage closet stands before them. Chaeyoung lets go of Jungkook’s wrist before she pulls it open and enters a dark room. She motions for Jungkook to follow and, with a bit of hesitance, he does. Chaeyoung closes the door and everything goes pitch-black. 

Jungkook’s pupils are blown wide due to the darkness, but he begins to make out Chaeyoung’s smaller form amongst all the cleaning supplies surrounding them. 

“The janitor’s closet is the last place I’d have in mind to find myself alone with you,” Jungkook jokes.

Chaeyoung lifts a playful eyebrow at that. “So you’ve thought of being alone with me?”

“N-No! I mean, that’s not—” Jungkook almost knocks over a bottle of glass cleaner as he tries to recover from Chaeyoung’s sudden cheekiness. “I mean I think about you,” he cooly nods before flinching at his own confession. “In a very respectful way!” he quickly adds.

Chaeyoung brightly laughs. “I’m just playing with you.” She steps forward and pushes a button on the wall behind Jungkook. A sharp line of blue light cascades down both of their bodies. 

“ _Welcome back, Son Chaeyoung_ ,” an automated voice chirps. 

The wall behind Chaeyoung descends into the floor to reveal a brightly-lit room. The small space is covered from the head to toe with white tiles. A table littered with buttons and blinking lights sits in the corner of the room.

“Is this a SimRoom?” Jungkook questions as he follows Chaeyoung to the table.

“Yeah,” she hums as she pokes at a few buttons. “Professor Yi showed me this room a while ago. No one uses it so he told me I can use it as long as no one else knows.” 

Jungkook shakes his head in disbelief and smiles. “Wow. For a mind reader, you’re awful at keeping secrets.

“I can easily make him forget if he finds out,” she counters. She turns to Jungkook with excitement in her eyes. “So, where do you wanna go? The world is literally at our fingertips.”

“The beach,” Jungkook answers easily. He's never been but he remembers watching movies about it during his childhood.

Chaeyoung clicks a few buttons and suddenly soft, warm sand is pushing up against their feet. Jungkook walks ahead of the table and he shakes his hair out of his eyes as the wind blows. His SimSuit morphs into swim shorts and a thin jacket as Chaeyoung takes her place beside him. She's still in her light sweater and jeans. Chaeyoung takes off her sneakers as they both sit on the sand.

A comfortable silence settles over them as they watch the waves rise and fall. Jungkook wishes things could just be like this: being as free as the seagulls that fly overhead. A moment of joy. He wouldn't mind Yoongi being here either. 

They sit there in silence for the most part. The converse sparingly, only making conversation about their day. It isn't until the sun says goodnight that Chaeyoung asks what's on Jungkook's mind. Jungkook doesn't answer for a while and he stares into the small fire they conjured up. 

He and Chaeyoung are swaddled up in a blanket. Jungkook has his arm around Chaeyoung’s shoulders as she rests her head against him. They've cuddled like this many times before but this time is different because this may be their last night together. Jungkook so badly wants to stay here forever.

“Me, too,” Chaeyoung sighs. She winces with regret and she apologizes as soon as she feels Jungkook's body tense up. “You're just thinking really loud right now. It's hard to block you out.”

“Sorry,” Jungkook says as he relaxes. 

He tangles his free hand with Chaeyoung's fingers under the blanket. The fact that both of her hands fit inside Jungkook's wakes a few butterflies in the pit of his belly, but it doesn't squash the anxiousness clouding his head. 

“I'm scared for tomorrow.”

“You have every right to be. You have no idea what they're gonna throw at you.”

Jungkook squeezes Chaeyoung's hands. “Test nine was almost a nightmare with Yoongi there. I can't imagine what test ten will be like.”

Silence settles over them again as the wind blows. Chaeyoung shivers and Jungkook wraps his arm around her waist to pull her closer. Chaeyoung's heart is beating like a loud drum in Jungkook's ears. He softly runs his thumb over her hand, trying to calm her nerves. 

  
  


Sadness suddenly fills Jungkook's mind and he looks down to find Chaeyoung trying her best to hold back tears. Her dam breaks as soon as she looks up at him.

Chaeyoung sniffs and wipes at her eyes. “Dammit, I promised myself I wouldn't do this,” she tries to laugh off. “I wish I didn't have three tests left so I could go with you.”

Jungkook kisses Chaeyoung’s hair as she hides her face in his neck. He wishes things could be different. He wishes they were soulmates. Most of all, he wishes they were normal. Just normal human beings that—

Chaeyoung lifts her head. “Jungkook, I want you to listen to me,” she says in all seriousness. “Tomorrow—or any other day after that—don't choose me.”

Jungkook's eyebrows pull together at that. “What?”

Chaeyoung sadly smiles as she looks at Jungkook like he's the eighth wonder of the world. 

“I can't think of anyone that can twirl a dagger on the tip of their finger. I can't think of anyone that can feel so much emotion and not be afraid to show it. I can't think of anyone else that loves his best friend as if he's his own blood. Your mutation may be the first thing people see but that doesn’t define you. You’re the only version of yourself but you want to be normal?” she sadly asks. “Being normal should be the least of your worries.”

Jungkook has so many questions running through his mind. Chaeyoung being cryptic is nothing new, but the fact that she knows something he doesn't is unsettling.

Jungkook’s concerned eyes glaze over as Chaeyoung wipes the last few seconds away from his memory, and he is overcome with an overwhelming urge to cry when he sees Chaeyoung trying to hold back her tears. 

He tenderly cups her cheek with his hand. “Hey, why are you crying?” 

Jungkook's eyes swim over her sad face as his head fills with guilt, longing, remorse, and just a little spark of hope. 

Chaeyoung wraps her arms around Jungkook’s torso and his hands hesitantly move down around her back, but something doesn't feel right. Something feels utterly wrong but Jungkook doesn't want to let her go to ask what's wrong. 

“I'm gonna miss you so much, Jungkook,” she whispers.

“I'm gonna miss you, too.”

Jungkook wakes up way before his alarm the next morning. He has no time to reminisce about last night before a group of men in black suits burst through his door. They blindfold him and escort him down a long hallway before he is suddenly stopped. Thin, rubbery material is thrown at his chest before it falls to the floor.

“Hurry up and put on your SimSuit,” Jungsuk says sternly. “Don't even think about taking that blindfold off. It's a part of your evaluation.”

In his bubble of darkness, Jungkook takes off his pajamas and shimmies into the suit with ease. He stands with his posture rigid, waiting on a command that never comes. Just as he hears a group of footsteps walk away from him, a robotic voice rings through the room.

“ _J_ _eon Jungkook. Identification number 097. Welcome to your last evaluation. Assignment: save one, kill one. Your test begins in three...two...one._ ”

Jungkook tilts his head in confusion. He’s usually given a very detailed assignment, but this time he isn’t. Before he can linger on thought, the floor is suddenly ripped from underneath him. 

His ankles and arms are pinned to the floor and just as he’s about to wriggle free, a sharp needle being jammed into the side of his neck. He can feel the thick liquid starting to spread through his veins but his mutation immediately starts to combat it.

Jungkook's body sinks into the floor against his will. “No, no... Wait,” he slurs. 

He feels himself being pulled down a hallway and into a dark room. He's thrown into a metal chair and helplessly sits as metal cuffs trap his limbs. Jungkook pulls against the metal to no avail as his senses begin to slowly come back. He isn't stopping until he's free. He won't stop until—

“Jungkook.”

Jungkook’s head snaps up at the sound of his name. “Chae?”

“Yoongi’s here, too,” Chaeyoung says sadly.

The lights are suddenly turned on, or so Jungkook thinks due to a brightness shining through his blindfold. The legs of a chair scrape across the floor and it stops just short of Jungkook. Goosebumps travel over Jungkook's body.

“Jeon Jungkook,” Jungsuk says as his voice echoes through the room. “You have successfully made it to test ten. All of your rigorous training has led you to this very moment. How you handle this test will determine if the Institute sees you as worthy of working out in the real world. I'm going to ask you a few questions and I want you to answer truthfully.”

Jungkook shakily breathes through his nose.

“Who is Son Chaeyoung to you?”

Someone he likes. Someone he cares for. Someone he never wants to lose. 

“She's my friend,” Jungkook says.

“But you'd like for her to be more?” Jungsuk asks. He grows impatient when Jungkook doesn't answer. “I saw you two last night. Answer the question.”

Jungkook flinches at that. “Yes! Okay?” he relents as his cheeks begin to blush. He can literally feel the smug look dripping from the elder’s face.

“Who is Min Yoongi to you?” Jungsuk continues.

His whole world. 

“He's my brother,” Jungkook honestly answers.

Jungsuk smirks. “Would you say you love him?”

Jungkook nods his head.

“You'd take a bullet for him, correct?” Jungsuk asks.

“Yes.”

The sound of a gun cocking fills the quiet room. “Min Yoongi, you'd do the same for him?”

Without hesitation, Yoongi says, “Any day.”

Jungkook gasps. 

_Save one, kill one._

This can't be happening. This can't be his last test.

“No!” Jungkook yells at the top of his lungs. He thrashes around in his seat. “Stop! Stop this! This can't—please, don't do this! Please,” he cries.

Footsteps make their way past Jungkook.

“Don't you dare touch her!” Yoongi yells.

Chaeyoung shrieks and Jungkook wants to see what's happening. Everyone's heartbeats including his own are clouding Jungkook’s senses.

“Shut up!” Jungsuk roars. “Min Yoongi. Always talking back and I can't ever seem to get rid of you! No matter how many Sims I put you in you always come for more. You get on my fucking nerves!”

“End the Sim now,” Yoongi says through gritted teeth. “There weren't any proctors watching before the Sim started! You planned this—Jungkook, this isn't a real Sim—”

A chair falls to the floor as a gunshot rings through the air and Jungsuk screams in pain. Jungkook can't see it but he can tell the butt of a gun is being smashed through flesh. Through bone. Cutting through mushy insides.

“Oh my God! Y-Yoongi!” Chaeyoung yells.

Jungkook helplessly sits as he listens to fighting and yelling. He starts to panic and his chest grows tight at the fact that he can't do anything. “Please, please,” he whimpers as Jungsuk’s screaming turns into weak groans. This isn't how the Sim is supposed to go. Suddenly a pair of hands are on him.

“It's okay, Jungkook. I'm gonna get you out of here,” Chaeyoung says quickly. 

She rips the blindfold from Jungkook’s eyes and his breath catches at the sight of her tear stricken face. She then moves to unlock one of Jungkook's hands from the metal chair but is stopped when Yoongi points a gun at the back of her head.

“Step away, Chaeyoung,” Yoongi says gravely.

Chaeyoung backs away from Jungkook with her hands in the air. “You don't have to do this, Yoongi. W-We can—”

“Stop talking!”

_Flash, crackle, pop. Boom!_

It begins to rain outside and every drop that hits the windows sounds like gunshots to Jungkook's ears. Jungkook finds Yoongi standing across the room. He's holding the gun with a vice-like grip and Jungsuk lies a bloody rag doll at Yoongi’s feet.

Jungkook shakes in his chair. “Hyung!”

Yoongi gestures the gun over to the table holding a case of syringes. “Pick up the empty one and fill it with Jungkook's blood.” He snaps when she doesn't move. “Don't make me shoot you, Chaeyoung! You know I never miss a shot. Shooting you between the eyes will be very easy if you don't do what I say.”

Chaeyoung slowly moves to the table and picks the empty syringe before turning around. She stares at Jungkook like this will be her last time seeing him. 

Everything goes in slow motion after that. Chaeyoung throws the syringe towards Yoongi to distract him as she pushes her arm through the barrier of the Sim to set off an alarm.

The dirty floor melts into polished concrete, the chipped walls begin to glitch and fade to black, Jungsuk’s dead body fades away as if he were never there, and Jungkook’s, Yoongi’s, and Chaeyoung’s street clothes morph into white bodysuits.

Just as the metal traps around Jungkook's limbs disappear, Chaeyoung turns to run for the exit. Jungkook's eyes widen as Yoongi pulls the trigger. He bolts from his chair and attempts to block the bullet, but goes straight through his chest and flies into Chaeyoung’s back. He yells with anger as he clotheslines Yoongi, sending them both through a window. They fall through a shower of shattered glass and crashland onto the roof of a car.

Jungkook pushes the heels of his palms into the dented car and rises to find Yoongi lying limp beneath him. 

“Yoongi?” he breathes. “Hey, hey, hyung!” he calls as he shakes Yoongi’s shoulder. He swallows down the lump in his throat when Yoongi shallowly breathes.

Yoongi coughs up blood and it splatters over Jungkook's face. “Jungkook-ah,” he softly wheezes as the rain washes away a bit of the red away from his lips. 

Blood begins to ooze from the back of Yoongi’s head and Jungkook scrambles to get his hands underneath his head to try to stop the bleeding but it's no use. 

“No, no, no,” Jungkook whimpers. Growing frantic, he gathers Yoongi into his arms. “Stay with me! Please! Someone Help!” 

Jungkook desperately looks around for anyone to come to Yoongi’s rescue, but lightning strikes across the sky to reveal they're surrounded by nothing but darkness and trees.

Yoongi breathes harshly and he grabs onto Jungkook for dear life. Jungkook’s mind fills with emotions of guilt, longing, remorse, and just a little spark of hope. Yoongi’s grip on Jungkook's hand loosens and the younger yells in panic.

“Yoongi hyung!” Jungkook screams over the rain. 

This can't be happening. It just can't. 

Jungkook presses Yoongi’s face into his neck as he cries. The rain starts to fall harder as if it's trying to tell Jungkook that the current situation doesn't even matter. Jungkook sobs until he starts to hyperventilate. His chest grows tight and he chokes on the little air that's getting into his lungs. The sound of the rain fades with Yoongi’s heartbeat.

_“We got two rogues right outside of the Institute,”_ a cop speaks into his walkie talkie.

Jungkook is suddenly blinded by bright flashlights, and before he can even process what's happening, the sensation of sharp pins and needles covers his body and he slumps off of the car. The weight of Yoongi’s body is the last thing he feels before everything fades to black.

“I’m so sorry about that, Jungkook,” Hani says sincerely, bringing Jungkook out of his thoughts.

Jungkook absently plays with his red string of fate as he blinks his tears away.

“Are things better now?” Hani carefully asks. “Has anything or anyone come into your life that has made it significantly better for you?”

“Yeah. My hyungs have been helping me.”

That piques the therapist’s interest. “New friends?”

Jungkook nods his head with a small smile. “Jin hyung, Jimin hyung, and Taehyungie hyung. They’re a little rough around the edges like me, but I think that’s what makes us a good team.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Lemme know what you think, I am very appreciative of feedback.
> 
> See you in the next chapter ~


	4. Interlude [Picaro]

* * *

**INTERLUDE: Taehyung's Origin**

* * *

_One year ago_

"Tae-baby! Wake up," Yoona calls from the bathroom. "You have an appointment with a client this morning. You know, the client that you don't wanna meet because he keeps making you paint his daughter's portrait."

Taehyung groggily groans and cracks one of his eyes open, catching a glimpse of his very pregnant wife waddling into the shower. The water starts to run and he rolls onto his back. He stretches over Yoona's side of the bed and he lies in the fading warmth left in the sheets. 

The digital clock on the wall reads 07:13. He has an hour to get ready to meet his client at their house on the other side of the district. He scoots out of bed and slips his feet into his house shoes before he shuffles across the room to the control panel on the wall. 

The sensor recognizes his face along with his unruly bed-head as the screen lights up.

_"Hi there, Mr. Kim!"_ a male voice brightly greets. _"It is currently 07:14 AM. The temperature outside is 50 degrees Fahrenheit with a low of 37 degrees Fahrenheit at 20:00 PM. Humidity is at 26%. It will be sunny all day—perfect weather for stargazing in the evening."_

"Perfect weather for stargazing, huh," Taehyung quietly repeats to himself. He might do just that with Yoona if she's up for it later. He walks into the bathroom and sensually whistles at his wife's silhouette behind the fogged glass of the shower.

"Shut up," Yoona half-chides. "You always do that." 

Taehyung can hear the tender playfulness in her voice even when she's irritable. He begins to brush his teeth and double taps his index finger on the mirror in front of him, bringing up an automated square live streaming the nation's news.

_"Mrs. President, do you have anything to say about the rising political-social tensions in our country?"_ a news reporter asks from behind the camera. 

_"You mean the tension between humans and mutants,"_ President Ahn gracefully redirects as she speaks into a microphone. _“I think that we as a country have forgotten that the mutants that walk among us are still human. Blood runs through their veins, they still feel emotion like you and me,”_ she gestures to the reporter. _“A few decades ago this country faced a civil war it never saw coming due to the explosion of a factory plant. Genetics and heredity are uncontrollable, but the way we handle them is. We were able to rebuild destroyed cities. Nothing should be holding us back from rebuilding our morality.”_

Another reporter stands. _“What about the rise in crime and poverty, Mrs. President? Mutants are running rampant in the streets.”_

_“Crime is nothing new under the sun. As for poverty, the unemployment rate has drastically dropped. Creating jobs for mutants has provided a safe space for humans and mutants to work alongside one another.”_

_“This doesn't excuse the mutants that have lost control, killing innocent humans,”_ the reporter chimes in.

_“No, it doesn't,”_ the President agrees. _“My advisors and I are working on a solution for that, but in the meanwhile, treat everyone as you would want to be treated. I get it, mutants are still an anomaly we haven't been able to figure out yet, but forcing mutants back into labor camps is the last thing I'll do. We've come too far as a nation to oppress those we don't understand—”_

Taehyung tunes out the news as he washes the toothpaste out of his mouth. 

He's neutral in the whole human-versus-mutant debate, but being human, he naturally has more sympathy for people that are like him. He neither likes nor dislikes mutants, but the thought of suddenly presenting one day terrifies him.

Yoona is washing the last of the suds out of her hair when Taehyung takes off his pajamas and slips into the shower behind her. He places his hands on either side of her hips and gently digs his thumbs into the tired muscles of Yoona's lower back. 

"Oh, Tae, that feels really good," she gratefully sighs as she leans into Taehyung's touch. A few moments later, she hands her husband a soapy rag over her shoulder. 

Taehyung snorts, knowing all too well that Yoona wants her back to be scrubbed and massaged. "You better not be giving your mom a hard time in there, Button," he playfully nags over Yoona's bare shoulder.

Yoona holds her protruding belly and smiles fondly, a habit she's taken ever since she started to show. "She's been good. She hasn't been kicking me like a soccer ball lately."

They both finish showering as a comfortable silence settles between them. Yoona steps out of the shower first, but not without a quick kiss on the shoulder from Taehyung. She blushes as she towels herself dry. She disappears from the bathroom and returns a few minutes later, clothed and out of breath. 

Taehyung doesn't miss the grimace on her face as he steps out of the shower. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah," Yoona breathes as she holds onto the counter for leverage. "I think it’s Braxton Hicks contractions."

Taehyung hovers but he gives his wife the space she needs. "You sure? I can call your doctor."

A small grin laces Yoona's lips as the pain fades away. She looks up at her husband through the mirror. "No, I talked to her yesterday. This is normal." She tries not to laugh at the distraught look on Taehyung's face. "I'm fine, Tae-baby, really. C'mon, I gotta get ready to spend the day buying Christmas presents with your mom and you have a client to meet."

They both get ready for the day, Taehyung lets his curly hair air dry as he makes the bed and packs his bag. Yoona puts on a bit of makeup and she makes a quick breakfast for the both of them before they leave. Taehyung greets his mother as she helps Yoona into the car. 

A few moments later, Taehyung finds himself on the interstate headed towards his client's home. He follows the address that was sent to him, driving up winding hills and through the man-made tunnels in the mountains. Taehyung smiles to himself as he drives. This will be the married couple's last Christmas before they have a baby to spoil for the next one.

A brisk slap on the back is what brings Taehyung back to reality. His client sits across from him, drinking at nine o'clock in the morning and Taehyung is trying his best not to judge. 

Taehyung crosses a leg over the other and winces when the hard leather sofa squeaks under his slacks. He glances at his untouched steaming mug of tea sitting on the coffee table in front of him and his client. He pulls on a tight grin. "So, Mr. Han, what kind of portrait are you looking to—"

Mr. Han suddenly starts crying. He sets down his coffee cup, almost missing the table completely, before wipes at his red eyes.

"Uh." Taehyung lets his mouth hang open and his eyebrows pull together. He wasn't expecting the appointment to go this way. "Sir, are you okay?"

"Oh, yes. I-I’m fine," Mr. Han waves off. He rubs his palms against his thighs as he recomposes himself. "My, um, my wife. She left me a few weeks ago… When I told her I presented."

Taehyung’s eyes grow wide at that. He rapidly blinks his eyes to make sure this isn’t a dream. He can’t believe he’s in the same room as a mutant. The man in front of him looks completely normal.

Taehyung is suddenly standing outside of Mr. Han’s house as he was just minutes ago. He looks around, taking in his surroundings as a dog barks across the street.

What the hell? How did he get out here?

Before Taehyung can get a grip on what’s happening to him, he is yanked into the driver’s seat of his car. Startled and confused, he starts to panic. He screams when Mr. Han opens the car door. His eyes tell Taehyung everything.

“I can rewind time,” Mr. Han explains after he convinces Taehyung to come back inside. He sits on the edge of his sofa. “Or at least that’s what I have gathered so far. I can’t go back that far, only a few minutes at a time. I’ve been praying to turn back time—days or even years—to fix everything, but I can’t. My own daughter is afraid of me.”

“Why are you telling me this?” Taehyung asks. His voice comes out a bit harsher than he intended. “You’re not wearing a Marker. I could report you to the authorities.”

The police are just a phone call away, one phone call that informs the government of any new mutants that have recently presented. 

“I’ll call them. I will,” Mr. Han says desperately. “I just need you to do this one thing before I do.” He rubs at his bald head and he pulls out an old, crumpled photo from his pocket. He slides it across the table. A weight is lifted off his shoulders when he sees Taehyung pick up the photo. 

It’s a picture of Mr. Han and his family. It’s pretty dated from how the ink has faded within the creases, but you can still see a loving family. The fifteen-year-old girl Taehyung has grown used to paint is ten years younger.

"I, uh, I haven't been the best husband lately. Or the best father. So I would like to have this painted so I can give this to my girls as a gift—to try to make things right,” Mr. Han says. “With it being so close to Christmas, I'll understand if you can't get it by then, but I'll pay you well."

Taehyung flips the small photo between his fingers. The worn edges and the softness of the photo gives him a sense of nostalgia. Although Teahyung is still a bit distraught, he can’t find it in himself to reject his client. 

He nods his head thoughtfully. He'd do the same for Yoona. "Of course."

A few moments later, Taehyung plops into his truck with a weary sigh. The turn of events still has him shaken up, but he wouldn’t turn down a client if he didn’t see any harm in working with them. 

He starts his car as he checks his emails and he returns a missed call he received from his boss. He thumbs to the text thread between him and his wife and he updates her about his morning.

  
  


**Taehyung 🐯**

_The appointment went well_

_My boss just called to let me know there's a meeting at noon_

_I might not be home when you get back_

  
  


**My Love**

_We'll probably still be running errands by then._

_Your mom mentioned grabbing burgers for lunch..._

_You know I can’t turn those down_ 🤤

_We just stopped at a little cafe in the mall and got hot cocoa!_

  
  


**Taehyung 🐯**

_You are so beautiful._

**My Love**

_Stop Tae_ 🙈

  
  


With a wide smile, Taehyung puts his phone down and drives to work. He’s met with bright hellos from his coworkers as he enters the building. He takes the elevator to his office. He sets his duffle bag down and he rolls up his sleeves, making a quick start on Mr. Han's portrait before the meeting starts. 

It's 11:30 when his assistant knocks on the door, bringing Taehyung out of his artistic trance. She politely bows before she hands him a small paper bag. 

"Mr. Kim. I knew you'd be cooped up in here so I brought you something to eat before your meeting."

Taehyung opens the bag to find a perfectly wrapped sandwich from his favorite deli down the street. "Dahyun, you didn't have to do this. Thank you," he says as he unwraps the sandwich and takes a big bite.

"I do have to, Mr. Kim. Can't have Mrs. Kim coming here and biting my head off again," she laughs.

Taehyung wipes his mouth with a napkin and he fondly smiles as he chews. He'll never forget seeing a three-month-pregnant Yoona screaming her head off at his poor assistant about him not eating while he's at work.

"Head to the boss's office once you're done," Dahyun softly advises as she exits the room. “Have a nice meeting, Mr. Artist Extraordinaire.”

Taehyung huffs a laugh and he quickly finishes his sandwich. He rolls down his sleeves and shrugs on a blazer. He's making his way out of the room when he glances at his phone sitting on his desk. He feels like he should bring it, but he knows how his boss gets when people have their phones during meetings, so he bites back the feeling in his gut and he heads down the hallway without it. 

During the meeting, Taehyung's phone fills with missed calls and unread texts from his wife.

**[ 2 missed calls from My Love ]**

**My Love**

_Pick up your phone_

  
  


**[ 3 missed calls from Mom ]**

  
  


_I'm at the hospital with your mom_

_The doctor said something's wrong with the baby_

  
  


**[ 2 missed calls from My Love ]**

_Baby please call me as soon as you can_

_I'm so scared_

  
  


Taehyung runs as fast he can as soon as a receptionist gives him his wife’s room number at the hospital. He can hear his heart beating in his chest as his car's engine roars to life. Yoona’s water broke a few weeks too early and the safety of her and their baby is the only thing on Taehyung’s mind.

He haphazardly parks outside of the ER and he rounds the corner only to find a group of nurses and a doctor rolling Yoona’s bed down the hall. He easily catches up to them. Yoona smiles at the sight of her husband, but Taehyung can tell she’s in pain. 

Taehyung grabs her hand and squeezes it as he jogs alongside her bed. “Oh, baby,” he whines. “I’m so sorry I couldn’t come sooner.”

Yoona shakes her head and kisses Taehyung knuckles. “Looks like Button wants to see us early,” she sniffs.

Taehyung smiles as tears roll down his cheek. He sees that they’re nearing a part of the hospital he can’t pass through. He reluctantly lets go of Yoona’s hand. “I’ll be right outside this door waiting for you two, okay?” he assures her just before the double doors close.

Taehyung waits for what feels like days in the waiting room. He can’t keep still as paces back forth in the corner of the room. Chills run down his fingers as a doctor calls from him. He rushes into the room Yoona is in. She loudly cries as Taehyung nears her.

“She's gone,” Yoona bawls as she leans over the bed’s railing and cries into Taehyung’s chest.

Taehyung’s world turns on itself as he gathers his wife in his arms. His heart breaks at the loss of their child. He holds Yoona close, one arm wrapped around her back and his other hand holding the side of her face.

Goosebumps run over Taehyung’s skin as Yoona’s body begins to shake against his body. 

A nurse screams as she enters the room and Taehyung looks down to find the veins underneath Yoona’s flesh begin to swell and darken. Vibrant colors leak from Taehyung's fingertips and onto her skin as her eyes roll back. She chokes and her face turns pale. 

Taehyung grows distraught as the hand holding Yoona’s face tingles. The red string on his wrist turns black and he can feel himself breathe easier, almost as if he’s taking the very air from Yoona’s lungs. 

Yoona collapses on the bed, limp and lifeless as the nurse runs down the hallways screaming.

Taehyung looks between the open door and his dead wife. He has to get out of here. Not just out of the hospital, but out of this _world_. 

He quickly rises from the bed and runs over to the glass door leading to a balcony, throwing it open as a gush of bitter wind slaps him across the face. He steps out onto the balcony and grabs onto the railing. His breathing picks up. He can hear voices coming from behind him.

What should he do? Go back inside? He'll surely be put on death row for— _no, I didn't kill her. I didn't kill her!_

Taehyung grabs one of the metal chairs and shoves its back against the door handle, giving him some time to think before the hospital's security team can get to him. Angry fists bang on the glass. Police sirens can be heard in the distance.

If he can't be in this world with Yoona and their baby, he'd rather not be in this world at all. Taehyung hikes his leg over the railing and he loses his balance. He falls and it seems like his descent is in slow motion. The busy city grows louder and louder the closer he is to the ground.

Hands suddenly grab at Taehyung's body and, oddly enough, he isn't falling to his death anymore, but instead, he is magically pulled into the warmth of a large house. The interior is a bit dated as if the home was passed down from generation to generation. Large, white clothes rest over the furniture, making the house appear abandoned.

_Where am I?_

“Are you okay?”

Taehyung scrambles away from the voice. What just happened? He should be dead right now.

He looks to his right to find a man looking at him with eyes full of concern. Out of habit, Taehyung’s eyes travel down to the man’s left arm to find a Marker on his arm. His eyes then go to the man’s wrist to find faded, red horizontal lines on his skin.

“What’s your mutation?" the man winces at the patch of grey flesh on the side of his neck. "Sucking the life out of everything you touch?”

“You're a Mutant,” Taehyung says shakily.

“So are you,” the man says defensively.

Taehyung shakes his head, unbelieving. “No, I'm not—”

“Mutant or not, life's worth living, Kim Taehyung.”

“How do you know my name?”

“Who doesn't know your name?” the man questions with a hint of amusement. “Every rich family in the country has a piece of yours hanging in their home.”

Taehyung looks past the man to find a painting from his latest collection mounted above the fireplace. Maybe everyone _does_ know his name… Which makes his situation even worse.

“Listen, I’m not a mutant,” Taehyung urges. “That’s the last thing I wanna be.”

“So we have something in common,” the man comments, Taehyung’s first sentence going right over his head.

Taehyung blinks at the man. “What?”

“I don’t want to be a mutant either. You see on the news just how bad it is for us out there. I just wanna be normal again. And I’m assuming you do, too,” the man inquires before Taehyung nods his head. “So if you’re willing to help me, I can help you.”

“Help you with what?”

The man peels off his own gloves and he holds them out for Taehyung to take. “Finding a cure.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Lemme know what you think, I am very appreciative of feedback.
> 
> See you in the next chapter ~


	5. The Second Episode

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Y’know the best part of this, doc? The part that really gets my gears turning? They were all mutants. And word on the street is that you hate us. Enough to kill us in a hospital and cover it up as a complication.”

* * *

**EPISODE 2: A Sight For Sore Eyes**

* * *

Lieutenant Detective Kim Namjoon, who’s impatiently leaning against the wall, straightens as soon as the door across from him opens. A young male wearing a Marker exits the room as his therapist bids him a soft goodbye. 

"See you next week, okay, Jungkook?" she smiles at the younger as he walks away. Her eyes catch Namjoon’s as he shuffles across the hallway. "Namjoon?"

“Hani,” Namjoon cautiously says, a lecture already forming on the tip of his tongue.

Hani lifts her hand, already putting two and two together and stopping Namjoon in his tracks. She waits to speak, making sure the young male that just left her office is out of earshot. 

“Before you ask, yes, I’m okay,” she quickly assures him. She ushers him into her office before she shuts the door.

Namjoon looks over his childhood friend with concerned eyes, trying to find any scratches or signs of a struggle on her skin.

“Stop, Joon,” Hani sighs as she sits at her desk. “He didn’t hurt me if that’s what you’re trying to figure out.”

Namjoon clenches his jaw. “He's a mutant.”

“He’s just a boy,” Hani defends.

“A boy that can hurt you,” Namjoon corrects. “What were you thinking, taking a mutant as a client? Are you crazy? You should’ve called someone from security to watch over your session. Better yet, you should’ve called me—”

“And what good would that do? He’s not some sort of rogue. He’s already registered in the federal census as a mutant per his association with the Institute,” Hani says as she puts away Jungkook’s files. She shakes her head with disappointment. “God, seriously, Namjoon? I should’ve called security? There’s no sense in scaring them when they’re already afraid of us.”

“My point still stands, especially since he’s from the Institute,” Namjoon argues. “He could have lost control. He could have surged.”

“Which hasn’t happened in a very long time,” Hani sighs. “If he was unstable, they wouldn’t have cleared him to even walk into the building. He has a life, friends even. He’s normal just like us.”

"Except he has abnormal cells running through his veins," Namjoon counters.

Hani sits down at her desk and begins typing away on her keyboard. “Shouldn’t you be solving cases, detective?”

“Well, I came by to see if you’re free for lunch,” Namjoon kindly offers with lifted eyebrows, but the more he watches Hani work, the lower his brows get. “But I see that you’re busy.”

“Sorry. I love you, Namjoon, but you're kinda pissing me off right now,” Hani says as her eyebrows pull together. “Maybe tomorrow, when we’re both off?” she asks hopefully. “I really need to get these notes typed before the weekend.”

Namjoon nods his head in reply. He moves to leave before turns to face his friend again. “I’m sorry. As soon as I heard you had a mutant as a client, I needed to check if you were okay,” he apologizes. “I just thought that—”

“I know,” Hani softly interrupts him as she looks over her desktop. “Everything's okay, Joon, really. I know you have your reasons.”

The corner of Namjoon’s mouth pulls at that. He could get on Hani’s last nerve and she still cares for him.

The winter air harshly blows outside and Namjoon suddenly remembers how the wind pulled at his padded coat as he was ice skating one day after middle school.

He fell on his butt as he attempted to spin, which resulted in three younger girls giggling at him. Determined and a bit embarrassed, Namjoon finds his footing and attempts to spin again, but this time he almost collides with a tree that stands in the middle of the frozen lake. 

One of the girls screams as the tree begins to fall away from Namjoon, bringing up its roots along with it.

Namjoon looks over to see a girl with her trembling hands in the air, shakily guiding the tree. He panics as the ice below his feet starts to crack and shift as the tree falls over.

The dark, frozen roots of the tree staring down at him is all he can see. Namjoon will never forget the sight.

“Are you okay?” one of the girls asks him as she scrambles over to him. She falls to her knees before she grabs his coat and shakes him to get his attention.

"You're not wearing a Marker," Namjoon accuses as he flinches away from her touch. “Y-You’re a mutant!”

The girl tries to explain that she was only trying to save him, but Namjoon is hearing none of that. He’s blabbering about how the tree could’ve fallen on him. The only thing on his mind is calling the police. 

Tears prick at her eyes as another girl skates over to them.

“Momo—”

Momo falls on her butt and begins to shake, seeming on the brink of a panic attack. “Chaeyoung! He said he’s gonna call the cops on me!”

The ice beneath her starts to crack and Namjoon is frozen still, too scared to move as Momo’s skin begins to turn red. She balls her hands into a tight fist and she screams as if she’s in pain

Chaeyoung eyes Namjoon before tending to the troubled girl. She pries Momo’s rigid fingers and places her gloved hands in them. “Momo, you need to calm down. Please, breathe—”

“She’s gonna surge!” Namjoon yells. 

“No, she’s not!” Chaeyoung barks back. 

Namjoon needs to get far away from here. He’s watched plenty of documentaries about mutants losing control of their powers t. There’s no way he’s going to end up dead in the aftermath of an explosion.

“Unnie,” the third girl whines as she approaches. She gasps when police sirens fill the air in the distance. 

Relief floods over Namjoon as the sirens grow louder. Chaeyoung moves quickly as she takes off her gloves and reaches for the youngest girl’s hands. She stares deeply into her eyes. 

“You were having a lot of fun ice skating by yourself up until a few moments ago. Forget about what just happened, okay? Run home. Forget about me and Momo once you get there,” Chaeyoung carefully tells her.

Namjoon’s eyes grow wide as the girl does as she’s told. He suspects she must be human, unlike the other two.

He’ll never forget the way the two young mutants kicked and screamed after they were dragged away by the cops.

Ever since his first unpleasant encounter with mutants, he’s never come to be comfortable around them. Sure, the girl may have saved him, but the way the tree moved by an invisible force still gives him nightmares.

“You good there, Namjoon?” Hani asks with concern, bringing him out of his thoughts.

“Uh, yeah,” Namjoon answers with a tight grin that doesn’t reach his eyes. “I’ll call you tomorrow,” he calls over his shoulder as he exits the room.

He hastily strides out of the clinic, looking for any sign of the mutant. He tiredly sighs when finds no signs of them.

Namjoon’s phone vibrates and he pulls it out of pocket. “Kim Namjoon speaking.”

_“Oh, man, LT,”_ a friendly voice comes through the speaker. _“Get to the station. You’re gonna love this.”_

  
  
  
  
  


Namjoon crosses his arms over his chest and stares through the one-way mirror lining the police station's interrogation room with a blank expression on his face. 

His half-empty cup of black coffee is starting to go cold on the table before him. He has no intention of finishing it, especially not now. Not when he has a lead to the biggest case of his career sitting in the next room.

"She's been here all day, LT. The chairs the government provides us aren't comfortable even at the very least. Bet her butt's numb by now," Namjoon’s colleague, Sehun, comments as he picks up his festive Christmas mug sitting next to Namjoon’s. 

He takes a swig of it before he sits up in his chair and begins typing away at his computer. 

"She's been pretty quiet, too. Can't get anything out of her. Maybe you can break her as you do with the others," Sehun says, his eyes never leaving the monitor.

Namjoon stares daggers into the back of his coworker's head. He and Sehun have been drinking buddies since their academy years, but he wouldn't hesitate to punch him if he got the chance. "I don't break my suspects," he counters. “Whatever that means.”

"Sure you don't," Sehun snorts.

"Lemme question her," Suho cooly interjects as he takes his place next to Namjoon. 

A sly smirk plays on his lips as Namjoon takes a step away from him with a muted grimace on his face. 

"I can rough her up a bit if you want,” Suho offers. After all, that thing in there is barely human. What's the worst that could happen?"

"The worst that could happen is we don't get any answers out of her if we don't play our cards right. You of all people should know this, Kim," Namjoon reprimands, hating that he shares a surname with the sleazy bastard. "Let's not forget what happened with your last case."

Sehun chuckles. "Yeah, we're trying to get a confession out of this one, Kim, not get into their pants."

Suho bites his tongue in annoyance and he plops down in the seat next to Sehun. Namjoon sighs as he makes his way to the door. 

"I put the files on the table for you," Sehun calls after him. "Have fun there, LT."

Namjoon exits the observation room in favor of entering the interrogation room. He comes to a stop once he enters the small room, letting the door softly close behind him. 

He eyes the young female at the table, half-amazed and half-concerned. He's only seen her on TV, her face headlining the nation's news channel and the small newspaper stands just outside the police station. 

The girl sits quietly, not even budging at the presence of the detective. Her skin looks as if it's lost all color, but it isn't hard to miss the muted golden tint under the surface. 

A few of her knuckles are split, heavy dark circles sit under her eyes, and her red hair sticks out and flares every which way over her head, as it has just been randomly chopped. A thick blanket hangs over her shoulders and she momentarily shivers, making the gold-plated fasteners that cuff her to the marble table release small honey-colored spores.

Namjoon purses his lips and clears his throat. He can feel Sehun’s and Suho's eyes on him, but that doesn’t distract him. He approaches the table with caution. He's heard this girl has the strength of a thousand men, but he trusts the reinforced shackles around her wrists are stronger than her. 

"Shin Ryujin. Day and year of birth, April 17th 3001. Is this information correct?" Namjoon asks, starting the interview from his standing position.

Ryujin coughs before she nimbly nods her head. "Yes."

Namjoon pulls the chair back and sits down in front of him. He opens up one of the folders lying on the table. Black and white holographic photos of a dead man lying on the floor litter the inside of the folder. 

Namjoon swipes his fingers over the photos so that they cascade over each other like a set of playing cards. 

Some of the pictures show splatters of blood covering the walls and the floor. Some are close-ups of dark fingerprints lining the man's body. The man’s throat is almost split into two by the unadulterated force that he was strangled with, but he can obviously tell that the suspect was trying to hold back. 

The dead man’s eyes are wide open, still holding some fear to them. The beginning signs of rigor mortis have started to settle in his fingers.

Namjoon looks up just in time to catch Ryujin looking at the pictures. A flash of guilt crosses her face, but Namjoon doesn't miss the hint of anger that tightens like a snake around her jaw. 

“Yi Sookwan. Your step-father. Strangled to death in his home by your hands. Is this correct?" Namjoon asks straightforwardly.

Ryujin tightens her lips, suppressing another cough while neither confirming nor denying the accusation. She looks down at her fingers and begins picking at her broken cuticles.

Namjoon sighs. He looks Ryujin over again now that she's closer. Her skin shows signs of bruising and abrasions. A few cuts here and there—but they don't seem to be healing as the people say they should. 

Namjoon saw what the people did to her on the news. They cut her hair, beat her, and dragged her through the streets until the police had to step in. 

"Why aren't you healing?” he asks. “You're a mutant, right? You should be invincible."

No reply.

"You do realize that you are currently in the police's custody and, by the authority of the district, you are accused of murder? Mutants abusing their power—especially on humans—goes against the very laws that govern and maintain the interactions between the two entities,” Namjoon carefully states. 

When the mutant doesn’t answer him, he bends his neck to force his way into Ryujin’s field of vision. 

“Do you have anything to say in your defense?”

Ryujin clenches her jaw and remains silent. 

"Okay." Namjoon grows even more determined. He rests her elbows on the table and leans forward. “If you don’t feel like answering my questions today, I’ll gladly interrogate your mother within the next hour.”

This grabs Ryujin’s attention. 

“No!” she snaps, making gold spores violently vibrate off of her handcuffs. “Please, don’t bring her here. She didn’t do anything, I swear.” 

She takes a wary glance at the dark glass lining the side of the room and releases a shaky breath as he looks back at Namjoon. 

“What will you do to me? I don’t have my strength anymore... Y-You’re gonna let them kill me, aren't you?”

Namjoon furrows his eyebrows at that. "What do you mean you don't have your powers anymore?"

She hesitates to answer that question. "Never mind. Just tell me what's gonna happen after you're done questioning me."

She’s read in history books what humans do to those that aren’t like them. She’s heard about countless mutants being probed, picked apart, and literally sucked dry of the abnormal cells that run through their veins, but that was four hundred years ago.

“I won’t sugarcoat it. If the judge isn’t in your favor you’ll be sent to an incinerator,” Namjoon says straight-forwardly as pure horror flashes over Ryujin’s face.

“Not death row?”

Namjoon shakes his head. “Mutants that break a law such as you have are cremated since injecting mutants with lethal liquids is useless.”

“Okay,” Ryujin quietly replies, already giving up.

Namjoon almost feels sorry for her. Almost. “I can lessen your sentence if you give me the answers I need.” 

Ryujin opens his mouth and Namjoon waits on the other side of the table with anticipation, but her hesitancy gets the best of her. She looks around as if there’s someone nearby to save her from the situation she’s in. 

Namjoon sits back in his chair. “I read your case. I understand why you did it. Your biological parents divorce when you presented at a young age. Your mother takes care of you before she remarries, and your stepfather—”

“My step-father beat me,” Ryujin interrupts, her hands clenched tight on the table. She stares at the detective with a sad scowl on his face.

Namjoon sees that he pulled a string, so he prods even further. “You killed a member of President Ahn’s cabinet,” he corrects.

“That doesn’t excuse all the horrible things he’s done!” Ryujin argues.

Namjoon can hear footsteps outside the door. He looks at the one-way mirror and shakes his head. He can handle this.

The room grows eerily calm as a crude smile forms on Ryujin’s face. She jerks her chin to the photos laying atop the evidence folder on the table. “I don’t understand those pictures are in black and white. You’re missing out on all the color,” she comments distantly.

Namjoon’s eyes grow wide at that. “You’re working with Picaro,” he incredulously remarks.

“Y’know the worst part of it all,” Ryujin continues as her eyes well with tears. 

A bitter laugh bubbles out her mouth and goosebumps travel down Namjoon’s body. 

“The first time he hit me, we found out we were soulmates. You should’ve seen the look of disgust on his face. Even fate couldn’t take away his hate for who I am. And now I’m coughing up a whole garden because of him... He wanted to push that anti-mutant bill so hard,” Ryujin tells him.

The way the mutant leans forward with a sinister look on her face has Namjoon sitting on the edge of his seat.

“Picaro is taking out anyone who wants to harm mutants," Ryujin informs him. "So, no, I don’t want you to lessen my sentence. I may be burned alive tomorrow but nothing will stop him, detective.”

Namjoon swallows that information down as a bitter taste lingers in the back of his throat. 

He’s got a new lead, but for some reason, he feels like he’s been set back ten steps in his investigation. Picaro was the last person he was expecting to turn up in this homicide case.

Guards take away the mutant after she refuses to give Namjoon any more information. He stands from the chair and leaves the room, needing to decompress after the interaction he just had. Sehun and Suho are hot on his heels, but he dismisses them as soon as he exits the police station.

A slight breeze washes over Namjoon’s frame as he walks outside. The sidewalk is busy with people walking to and fro, but he finds his way to a new cafe that recently opened near the police station. He figures he should try it out since Hani has him hooked on vanilla lattes lately. 

Bells chime as Namjoon pushes through the glass door. He’s hit with the warm, bittersweet aroma of coffee beans. A barista behind the counter sends him a soft smile as he orders a cup of joe. 

Namjoon sits down in the corner of the small shop as he waits for his drink. A young couple sits a few tables away from him. They sit close to one another, looking at each other like they’re the only ones in the coffee shop. 

Namjoon sighs. His eyes wander the room before they return to his hands. He can't help but feel wistful as he looks at the red string tied around his wrist. The small tendril wraps snuggly around his wrist, gracefully resting upon the ever-beating radial pulse just under his thumb. 

Fate. Something that he tries not to think about. A thing that binds you to the person who you’re destined to be with until the day you die. The string of fate is supposed to be a joyous thing. 

Namjoon has dated a few people, he isn’t afraid of getting to know someone on an intimate level. He’s just afraid of _who_ — 

“Oh, my God! I'm so sorry!” 

A heap of napkins is suddenly being pressed against Namjoon’s abdomen and he looks up to see a worried man spewing out frantic apologies as he tries to clean up the spilled coffee without invading too much of his personal space.

“No worries,” Namjoon says with a tight smile as he rises from his seat.

A coffee mug lies in shattered pieces on the ground and the warm liquid starts to seep into his pants. Namjoon winces as the material sticks to his thighs.

They both bend down to pick up the broken pieces of porcelain and the man huffs in frustration. “Um, l-lemme get you another coffee. I’ll pay—” A cat catches his tongue as soon as his fingers touch Namjoon’s.

The sounds around them fade away as if someone is turning down the volume with a manual dial. 

Namjoon’s red string of fate tightens over his wrist before it slacks and disappears before it reappears again. He watches the same thing happen to the stranger that spilled coffee on his pants.

Namjoon goes still as their eyes meet. 

Albeit the panicked look on his face, the man before him is beautiful—probably the most handsome man Namjoon has ever met, and just as quick as the man appeared, he’s gone with the blink of an eye.

“Hey, man. Are you okay?” the barista from earlier asks.

Namjoon rises to his feet, his face is flushed but he keeps a composed demeanor about him. His heart is racing. He curses at himself for not asking him for his name. The red string around his wrist tingles against his skin, but he ignores it.

“Yeah, sorry about that,” Namjoon gestures to the mess on the floor.

He forgets about the coffee he paid for as he strides out of the shop and into the hustle and bustle of the city. The winter air brings him back to his senses.

Namjoon tells himself to forget the encounter he just had. He plays it off for the lack of sleep he’s been getting. Yeah, it was just a figment of his imagination, but he finds himself looking for the handsome man in the crowd.

He needs to focus.

Focus on catching the imaginative escape artist, Picaro.

A frantic Jin suddenly appears in the warmth of Jungkook’s bedroom.

Acid bubbles in the back of his throat at the thought of what just happened. This morning’s breakfast threatens to spill over his tongue as he pushes himself up on his knees.

He just wanted to get his usual cup of coffee on his way home, not run into his soulmate— _oh, God, I ran into my_ —

“Hyung?” Jungkook asks as he kneels in front of him, his journal and earphones lie forgotten on his bed. His face scrunches with concern as he wipes a stray tear from Jin’s cheek. “What’s wrong?”

“I met him,” Jin is all he says as Jungkook waits for the elder to say more.

“Met who?”

“My soulmate.”

The room is quiet save for the music playing from Jungkook’s earphones. 

Jin’s first thought was to escape the coffee shop as soon as his red string of fate changed colors. He had a feeling not to go out today without his Marker. He should’ve listened to his gut. The dried coffee sticking to his fingers only makes matters worse as he picks himself up off the floor.

“What do I do?” Jin asks desperately.

“You’re bleeding.” The question flies over Jungkook’s head as he stares at Jin's wrist. He takes Jin’s hands into his own. Jungkook suddenly snaps his head up, placing his index finger over his lips before three rapid knocks sound at the door.

"Jungkook?" Jimin asks.

"You can come in, hyung," Jungkook calls.

Jimin phases through the door, foregoing opening the door as a normal person would. He pauses at the sight of Jin and Jungkook. “What’s going on here?” he asks, looking at their linked hands.

Jin frazzles at Jimin’s presence. “Nothing,” he quickly gives as he backs away from Jungkook. He doesn’t miss the way Jimin glances at the dried coffee stains on his pants.

Jimin stares at Jin, his face hardening, but he doesn’t pry, at least not yet. “We have a mission tonight. Meet me and Taehyung downstairs for a brief when you two are done with whatever is happening here,” Jimin says with a questioning look on his face.

Jimin turns to leave, phasing through the door once again and ending the conversation, and Jungkook raises a finger to his lips again, waiting for Jimin’s footsteps to fade away before he speaks again.

“Why did you lie?” Jungkook asks accusingly.

“I didn’t lie, JK,” Jin exasperates. “It really is nothing if I don’t think about it.”

“You know how Jimin hyung and Taehyung hyung get. This isn’t going to end well.”

“Their reaction is the reason why I didn’t tell him, at least for now,” Jin tries to justify. “We’re so close to finding Glass. This will only get in our way.” 

“Whether we find Glass or not, there’s no way you can just ignore this without you or your soulmate dying,” Jungkook argues.

“No one’s going to die.”

“Yeah, tell me that when you find him at our front door coughing up flowers.”

Jin pauses at that thought. He’s killed many people without regret, but he may regret this if he doesn’t do something about it. But that something has him scared out of mind.

“What do you suggest I do?” Jin asks. 

This could change the whole dynamic of their group. Taehyung, Jimin, Jungkook. They’re Jin’s world right now, and adding his soulmate to the equation could make a messy result.

Jin looks down at his string of fate and then at Jungkook who’s glaring at him knowingly. “I’ll meet with him,” Jin settles. “I’ll meet him and talk with him… About us.”

“And then,” Jungkook pushes with raised eyebrows.

“And then I’ll tell Jimin and Taehyung,” Jin reluctantly agrees.

Jungkook nods his head and moves to sit on his bed. “Do you even know his name?”

“No, I was too busy teleporting the hell out of there to ask!”

“You’re doomed,” Jungkook groans. “Did you get a chance to look at him before you left?”

Jin’s tense shoulders lower as he reminisces what happened a few moments ago. Everything happened so fast, but he knew his world stopped when their eyes met. A smile threatens to play on his lips. “He was handsome. He had bags under his eyes like he hadn’t slept well in a few days, but he was handsome.”

Jungkook grins at that. “Happy for you, hyung.”

But that happiness gets cut short. 

Jin shakes his head. “He wasn’t wearing a Marker.”

Jungkook’s eyes widen to the size of saucers at that. “Shit. How is that even possible?”

“Well, it became possible today,” Jin laments. 

Human-mutant relationships have a tendency to not last in a society humans fear the mere thought of a mutant.

“I wasn’t wearing mine today either,” Jin tells the younger. 

He wonders what kind of reaction his soulmate would have had if he did wear his Marker today. Would his soulmate have run? Spit in his face? Called the cops?

“What he doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” Jin hesitantly says.

“Hyung,” Jungkook says sadly. “How will you find him?”

Jin stares longingly out of the window as the sun begins to set. He could spot his soulmate even in a crowd after just meeting him. “Don’t worry. I have my way of finding people.”

  
  
  
  


  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  


The digital clock on the wall reads 23:33 PM. 

Doctor Keng exhales through his nose. An unconscious patient lies unconscious on the surgical table before him. This is his last surgery before he gets a well-deserved break with his family.

His hands slightly tremble from the lack of sleep he's gotten from the last few nights. He clenches them closed. “Scalpel, please,” he says evenly.

The nurse picks up the reflective metal from the instrument stand and cautiously places it into the doctor’s open hand. “Scalpel, Doctor Keng.”

Just as the doctor is about to make his first incision into the patient’s chest, the doors burst open behind him. Jimin, Taehyung, and Jungkook coolly walk into the room like they own the whole hospital. 

Jimin easily knocks out the male nurse that rushes for the panic button. Blood spews out his nose as he falls to the floor. He looks down at him with disgust as he wrings out his fingers. “Can’t have you alarming everyone, can we?”

“W-What are you doing?” Doctor Keng stammers as Jimin pulls a gun from his hip and points it at the other nurse in the room. He bumps into the instrument table next to him, knocking over the tools on the table. “You are not authorized to be in here!”

Jungkook quickly rounds the surgical table and places a firm hand on the anesthetist’s shoulder, forcing him back down into his chair before he can try to run. 

“Oh, don’t worry,” Jimin winks. “We got all the authorization we need.”

Taehyung saunters over to the computer in the corner of the room and he reads the description of the surgery they just interrupted. He smirks as Jungkook places a dagger against the anesthetist’s carotid artery. “How about we turn this lobectomy into a lobotomy, hm?” 

Taehyung grabs the doctor and yanks the scalpel out of the doctor’s hand before he pushes him into the next conjoining room. Taehyung manhandles him onto the surgical table and lands a swift punch to the doctor’s face, stunning the older man as he begins to tie safety straps around the doctor’s wrists and ankles. 

“You’re a mutant!” he yells as he struggles against the straps.

Taehyung stuffs his gloved hands in his pockets as he circles the table. “Took you that long to figure that out, doc? And I thought you were smart,” he scoffs.

Doctor Keng shakily breathes through his nose. “You must want something.”

Taehyung stops walking and glares down at the doctor. “This isn’t about something I want. It’s about something you did.” 

Taehyung can see the doctor racking his brain for whatever he is talking about until his patience starts to wear thin. He pulls out a set of crumpled pictures from his trench coat and the doctor does his best to look at the pictures from his lying position.

“Remember them? Hirai Momo, Na Jaemin, Lim Jaebeom,” Taehyung lists off. “You killed them. On purpose.”

Doctor Keng shakes his head. “I don’t know what you’re talking about. T-They had complications during their surgeries—” 

“You call them complications? You performed a lobectomy, a procedure you have become famous for, on all three of them. Lim Jaebeom was wheeled out of this very room with a scalpel left in his right lung, you opened up Na Jaemin without an anesthetist present, and Hirai Momo didn’t even make it ten minutes into her surgery.”

Taehyung shrugs his shoulders in mock nonchalance as he rounds the table again.

“But they were all complications, you say… Y’know the best part of this, doc? The part that really gets my gears turning?” Taehyung asks as he gestures towards his friends in the other room. “They were all mutants. And word on the street is that you hate us. Enough to kill us in a hospital and cover it up as a complication.”

“So you wanna kill me? Is that it? Do you want to get revenge for your friends? This is why people are afraid of you mutants!” Doctor Keng furiously spits.

Taehyung rolls his eyes. That’s what they all say. “You’re right about one thing. I do wanna kill you, but I won’t do that just yet. I need answers first.” 

The doctor shifts uncomfortably as Taehyung reaches up to turn on the operatory lights overhead. He pulls a wheeled chair from the opposite side of the room and rides it back to Doctor Keng’s side. 

Taehyung sits against the back of the chair with a sigh as he crosses his arms and legs. “Where's Glass?”

“I-I don’t know.”

“Where is Glass?” Taehyung asks again, his tone turning darker this time.

Sweat is accumulating around Doctor Keng’s temples. He pulls against the straps holding him down. “Listen, I have no idea what you—”

Taehyung pulls a syringe from his coat as he suddenly rises from his seat. “Sodium thiopental,” he says as he takes off the cap, presenting the thin needle as a gift. “I’m sure you’re familiar with this. You used it on Na Jaemin before you ripped the flowers out of his lungs.” He injects the medication into the doctor’s neck without hesitation. “How are you feeling, hm? Relaxed?”

“You won’t get away with this,” the doctor slurs.

Taehyung turns his attention to the instrument stand beside the surgical table and he selects a pick-like instrument from its surface along with a mallet. “Kitty P, Mercy. Keep him still,” he instructs as he stands over the doctor. 

Jimin and Jungkook come into the room then. Taehyung places the pick into the inner corner of Doctor Keng’s eye as Jimin holds either side of his head and Jungkook holds him down by his jaw. The doctor weakly calls out for help. The nurses and the anesthetist are knocked out cold or dead in the other room.

“Stop moving,” Jimin commands, and every muscle in Doctor Keng’s body goes stiff.

Taehyung slightly nudges the doctor’s eyeball and slips the pick past it in order to rest it on his skull, just above his prefrontal lobe. “Let’s see if you’ll answer my question now,” he says with a sinister look on his face. 

Doctor Keng breathes heavily at the sight above him: three mutants looking down at him like a lab rat. He winces at the first knock against his skull, his vision blurs to white before Taehyung’s face reappears.

Taehyung knocks the mallet against the back of the pick once more. “I’ll ask again. Where is Glass?”

The doctor struggles to open his mouth and Jungkook releases the doctor’s jaw just enough for him to talk before Jimin instructs the doctor to speak. 

“I told you I don’t know!” the doctor says anxiously.

“Liar.” Taehyung taps the pick with the mallet. “You were with them a week ago. Don't try to make up some excuse. We have you on video.”

Doctor Keng opens his mouth, but he quickly closes it. He’s caught in a lie and Taehyung knows the truth. 

“I-I met up with them briefly, but I swear I don’t know where they are now! I couldn’t even see their face!” the doctor relents.

“What did you two talk about?” Taehyung asks. When the doctor doesn’t answer, Teahyung knocks the pick deeper into his skull.

“Tell us what you know before you lose yourself, doctor,” Jimin says sternly.

“A cure!” Doctor Keng cries. “They’re trying to formulate a cure for mutants! Glass has been running tests on your kind—they’ve been unsuccessful,” the doctor frantically explains. “I-I heard they’re still in the city!”

“Who did you hear that from?” Taehyung lifts the mallet in the air again. He can feel the bits of crushed bone beneath the pick.

“Lee Taemin!” the doctor yells as tears stream down into his ears. “I told you what you wanted to know. Now please, let me go!”

Lee Taemin. Taehyung knows exactly who that is and where to find him. 

Taehyung takes the pick away and tosses it over his shoulder. “Kitty.” 

Jimin whips out his pistol and shoots the doctor without remorse.

Taehyung pries off one of his gloves as he stands over Doctor Keng’s dead body. He uses his index and middle fingers to close the doctor’s glazed eyes, his fingers leaving a trail of opalescent colors covering dark, raised veins over the doctor's eyelids.

Jin appears out of thin air just as sirens can be heard in the distance, his black hair is windswept from teleporting. “We gotta go. Now. Cops are on their way.”

“Alright. We got what we needed for now. Right, Tae?” Jimin asks as he holsters his gun in the back of his pants.

Taehyung looks distantly at the dead body on the surgical table. “Yeah.”

They all place a hand on Jin before he teleports them all out of the hospital. Nothing but a dissipating black mist is left as security guards and cops swarm the room. Jimin, Taehyung, and Jungkook fall into a clumsy heap on the floor of their home a few seconds later.

“Damn,” Jungkook groans as he rolls onto his back. “Never gonna get used to that.”

Jin shakes his head, but a fond smile plays on his lips as he looks down at his friends. “You should be used to it now. How many sticky situations have we teleported from?”

“Way too many,” Jimin comments as he helps Taehyung to his feet. He quickly picks up on Taehyung’s dull mood as Jin and Jungkook leave them. His silence brings out the curiosity in Jimin. “Tae?” 

Taehyung doesn’t answer. 

Jimin follows the younger as he treks to the kitchen. He sits on a barstool, resting his elbows on the marble island as he watches Taehyung with furrowed eyebrows. “You good?”

Taehyung sighs as he pulls open the fridge and dejectedly stares at its contents. “Yeah, Jimin hyung. I’m fine.”

“Doesn’t look like it.” Jimin sits back against the stool and crosses his arms over his chest. “We finally got a lead. You should be somewhat happy, right?”

Taehyung plucks out a water bottle before he closes the fridge shut. “I won’t be happy until I’m normal.”

“Tae…”

The younger steals a swig of water before he tosses it back into the fridge. He flicks his wrist and looks down at his watch. One o’clock in the morning. “We should go. Lee Taemin should be at his bar by now.”

Jimin pauses and looks at Taehyung for a moment, thinking of something to say to make the situation lighter, but he digresses.

Thirty minutes later, Jimin’s Lamborghini revs to a stop as the engine cuts off. Taehyung steps out of the car and he is instantly hit with the muggy air that comes just before a heavy rain shower. 

The neon lights reading REPLAY casts a yellow light on his face. Taehyung dismisses the NO MUTANTS sign just above the door. 

Jungkook rounds the car with a sucker in his mouth, a habit he recently picked up to cover up his anxiety. He brushes his long fringe away from his forehead as Jimin and Taehyung make their way to the building. 

“There's a lot of people in there,” Jungkook comments. 

He can feel all the heartbeats inside the thick walls. The muted sounds just through the door pound at his head. He rubs at his right temple.

“You okay, JK?” Jin asks, bringing the younger out of his thoughts.

Jungkook nods his head, but Jin can tell he's lying. “Just a headache.”

“From earlier?” Jin implores.

Jungkook clenches his jaw. “We didn't have to those people at the hospital,” he whispers. “And that doctor was telling the truth. I could feel it.”

“You know Taehyung doesn't like to leave loose strings.”

“Yeah, I know,” Jungkook sighs. He stuffs his hands in his pockets and shakes his head, which cues the others to begin walking towards the club.

The place is full of people dancing, drinking, and making out with one another like there is no tomorrow as they enter the establishment. Taehyung easily spots Lee Taemin sitting at a poker table in the VIP corner of the large room.

The boys spread out and take in their surroundings. Jin perches on the stool at the bar near the entrance. Jimin makes himself at home on the dance floor in the middle room. Jungkook takes his place next to a vintage jukebox.

Taehyung approaches Lee Taemin and his posse. He keeps an eye on the three men doing a bad job of keeping their guns concealed under their jackets.

Taemin’s eyes light up at the sight of Taehyung. His eyes swim over Taehyung’s form as he puts down his cards and he stifles a cough into the elbow of his silk shirt. 

“Trenchcoat, leather gloves, cold demeanor,” he whistles seductively. “Just the kind of man I'd like to be wrecked by. Let him in.”

A large man dressed in black lets Taehyung into the private area and a pair of ladies latch onto him instantly. Taehyung flinches at the sudden feeling of roaming fingers over his biceps. Everything in him is screaming for these women to stop touching him, but he doesn’t voice it. 

Taehyung takes a seat at the velvet table in the middle of Taemin’s men. A woman tries to sit in his lap, but he stops her.

“Sorry, baby. I need to focus on this game. I can’t have someone as sexy as you distracting me, can I?” he asks with a suave tone. He winks at her, making her smile on the sofa behind Taemin. 

Goosebumps travel across Taehyung’s skin as an invisible force graces his body and he looks up to see another woman making an appearance at the table. A slender woman with choppy bangs finds her way onto Taemin’s lap. He wraps an arm around her waist. 

“Find someone new to play with, baby?” she purrs. Her pale eyes almost meet Taehyung’s.

Taemin smirks as he clears his throat. “We’ll see how he holds up against me. Can I deal you in?” he asks Taehyung.

“Sure. What can I get for a thousand bucks?” Taehyung asks.

Taemin’s boys hoot and holler like Taehyung has told the funniest joke they've ever heard. 

“Looks like you carry a few shiny nickels,” Taemin remarks.

Taehyung shrugs nonchalantly. “Something like that.”

Taemin begins dealing cards, his slender fingers moving at an expert speed. “So what brings you to my establishment?” he asks elegantly, making small talk.

Taehyung can feel everyone’s eyes on him. “A man named Doctor Keng,” he supplies. He catches Taemin’s hands stilling for a fraction of a second before he tosses a card to Taehyung’s side of the table. “I’m looking for someone that goes by the alias of Glass. I was told you know where to find them.”

Taemin’s eyes turn dark as he continues dealing cards. “Why would a mere human like me know where a mutant is?”

“Oh, I think you do know.” Taehyung leans forward. “Because I know exactly who you are, _Lucifer_.”

Taemin smirks in amusement although he’s been caught. Only a small group of people call him by his alias and he intends to keep it that way. He twirls the last card in his hand as his irises and the tips of his fingers start to glow a vibrant purple.

With a powerful flick of his wrist, Taemin throws the card at Taehyung. The card explodes against his chest with radiating hues of violet, blue, and yellow and the impact sends him flying out of his seat. Taehyung's head makes a sickening thwack against the drywall. 

The sound of guns cocking and daggers being unsheathed can be heard as things suddenly go quiet in the room. 

Jimin has his rose quartz encrusted pistol pressed against the back of Taemin’s head. Jin has two Glocks pointing at two of Taemin’s men while Jungkook has two daggers ready to throw at the third.

“Everyone out. Now!” Jimin yells. 

No one hesitates as they all scramble out of the building. The woman that was in Taemin’s lap stays but she keeps her distance.

"What a shame." Taehyung rises to his feet and cracks his neck. “I was looking forward to playing at least one game with you. I would’ve drained you of all your assets,” he says as he stalks towards Taemin. He nods his head, cueing Jin and Jungkook to swiftly kill his men.

Taemin’s fingers glow purple once again as he sends a metal-spiked card hurtling towards Taehyung. It slices the skin right below his left eye and he loses all his patience. He lunges forward and grabs Taemin's hands, splaying them palm-side down on the playing table before Jungkook strikes his daggers through both of them. 

Taemin screams in pain as Taehyung slams his head face-down against the table. He takes off one of his gloves before he grips the back of Taemin’s neck. The mere contact makes Taemin choke on his own breath. The veins underneath his flesh begin to swell and darken as Taehyung’s eyes roll to the back of his head.

_A man dressed in black stands before Taemin._

_He wears a worn and slightly tattered baseball cap, which casts a deep shadow over his eyes, as his face is covered by a black mask and long, dark fringe. He silently stares at the briefcase Taemin is carrying._

_Taemin grows confused at that. He lowers the briefcase back to his side. “What? I was told you wanted money.”_

_“Do you not understand how this works?” the man in black says bluntly. “You have to hand yourself over to be tested. This isn’t some drug you buy on the streets to take home.”_

_"No, you're taking my money. That's what I arranged," Taemin impatiently says as he lifts his briefcase again, the black square swings on its hinges at the sudden movement. "C’mon man! I’m desperate!”_

The scene abruptly cuts before Taehyung can continue watching.

Jimin shakes his arm. “Snap out of it, Tae. He’s gone.”

Taehyung comes to and he releases his grip from Taemin with a shaky breath. He looks down to find Taemin’s head half-submerged in a heap of lilac flower petals.

“What did you see?” Jin asks.

Taehyung processes his response as his fingers begin to glow purple and Taemin’s deck of cards float towards him, finding their new home inside of the pocket of his trenchcoat. He breathes in and a purple mist seeps past his lips as he exhales.

Maybe his search for Glass is a bigger deal than he thought.

"He had Hanahaki Disease. He sought out Glass for a cure," the woman from earlier explains for Taehyung. She wraps her hands around her slight biceps. Her fingers rub at the fading bruise on her shoulder. "He came home angry that day."

“Did he try to go to Doctor Keng?” Jin asks.

The woman shakes her head. “No, Taemin believed he killed one of his friends.” Her grey eyes wander in Taehyung’s direction. “Thank you.”

Taehyung's eyebrows furrow at that. “For what?”

“Killing him,” she supplies. “He's killed a lot of people. Beat a lot of women. Made a lot of promises he never intended to keep. He deserved what he had come to him.”

Taehyung's eyes glaze over her skimpy dress. "Pretty brave of you to be surrounded by humans without your Marker."

The woman smirks as she rubs her bare arm where her black band should be. "I may be blind but I tell you guys aren't wearing yours either."

“Hyung,” Jungkook suddenly says. “The cops are coming.”

The boys gather around Jin to make a quick escape, but Jimin stops just short of their circle. He looks at the woman before looking at Taehyung. “She should come with us.”

“We barely know her,” Taehyung cautiously counters.

“You were the one that said to be on the lookout for someone new since we lost Ryujin. They're gonna kill her if they find her within a mile's radius of this club.”

“We don’t have time for this, guys,” Jin interrupts as the police sirens sound in the distance. He turns to the woman and holds out his hand, letting her make the decision. “You coming with us or not?”

Taehyung feels those goosebumps travel down his body again as she approaches. As soon as she takes Jin’s hand the rest of the boys gather closer before they suddenly disappear.

They fall into a clumsy heap on the floor of their home for the second time that night. The usual complaints and gripings about Jin’s teleportation power never come and it throws Taehyung off until—

“It’s you,” the woman breathes. Her pale eyes look terrified but she doesn’t shy away from Jimin’s touch.

Jimin’s string of fate turns white before it fades back into a dark crimson. He looks into her blind eyes like he’s found a home.

Taehyung finds himself in awe at the moment of his childhood friend finally finding his soulmate, but the undertones of jealousy and anger linger in the back of his mind. He pushes those thoughts away as he helps Jungkook to his feet.

Jungkook doesn’t let go of his hand. Taehyung knows Jungkook knows how he’s feeling right now and Taehyung has half a mind to punch the words off of the younger’s tongue if he's brave enough to put any unwanted attention on Taehyung.

“I’m Jimin,” he quickly introduces himself, relief dripping off of his words.

“Seulgi,” she hesitantly gives. Her fingers find Jimin’s as a small smile pulls at her lips.

Jin pats Taehyung’s shoulder. “I’ll go prepare one of the guest rooms for her.”

Jungkook lets go of Taehyung’s hand before he follows after Jin, leaving Taehyung with his thoughts.

Taehyung turns away as Jimin carefully pulls his soulmate to her feet. He wordlessly treks to his room and closes the door to block out the rest of the world before he shrugs off his trench coat.

He should be happy. He’s made so much progress on finding Glass, but for some reason, he feels like he’s been set back in his plans. He tries not to blame it on Jimin. He really tries not to.

Taehyung tries not to think of Jungkook, Jin, or Jimin leaving him once they find their soulmates.

It’s not Jimin’s fault he found his soulmate tonight. Taehyung has braced himself for this moment but nothing to take away the fact that he killed his soulmate just after they lost their child.

Taehyung sighs as he shuffles over to a blank canvas sitting on an easel in the corner of his room. He sifts through his large collection of paint before he picks up a paintbrush.

He hesitates on what to create, but he needs to get his creeping emotions out of his system. The image of Jimin and Seulgi’s tangled fingers burn in his mind so he paints that. 

He paints the fading bruises on Jimin’s knuckles. He paints the chipped polish on Seulgi’s nails. He dabs a luscious red over their wrists and he can’t help but look at his own. 

Black, symbolizing the loss of a soulmate. Taehyung has only seen a handful of other people with black strings hanging off their wrists.

The sight keeps him determined to find a cure for his mutation. 

It keeps him determined to be normal again.


	6. The Third Episode

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “I won’t apologize for what has become of me, but the very last thing I need is my own friends thinking that I’m strange.”

* * *

**EPISODE 3: We’re Getting Closer**

* * *

The worn wheels of Namjoon's car come to a screeching halt just outside of Replay. His sudden presence garners a bit of attention from a few bystanders. A growing crowd and a few news outlets have beaten him to the scene. 

Namjoon winces as a young woman pans the camera of her cell phone towards him. He can see various social media headlines now. "Well-known detective of Seoul City seen at the crime scene of what remains of a shootout", will no doubt be trending by the morning.

Namjoon pulls his key from the ignition. The muted commotion on the other side of the windshield fills his ears as lowers his head and sighs. He's late to a crime scene for the first time in his career. 

Maybe he shouldn't have driven across to a random coffee to forget the event that happened earlier today. His belly suddenly fills the faintest of butterflies. It’s almost one in the morning and he can’t shake his soulmate from his mind.

Namjoon reluctantly exits his car with a deep sigh. He rubs his hands together, trying to warm his fingers against the cold air as walks towards the club. He keeps his head down to avoid any prying questions as he silently but politely elbows his way to the holographic yellow tape blocking the club.

Sehun meets him halfway, appearing a bit flustered to Namjoon’s surprise as he jogs through the holographic tape. “Shit, LT. Where have you been? You're usually the first one here.”

_The man huffs in frustration over the broken porcelain scattered across the floor. “Um, l-lemme get you another coffee. I’ll pay—”_

“Lieutenant?” Sehun asks, his voice more concerned this time.

A man walks towards them before Namjoon can respond. 

“Lieutenant Kim Namjoon?” The man glances at Namjoon’s arm out of habit to find that he isn’t wearing a Marker before he slips his tablet into his armpit and holds out his hand. "I’m Park Chanyeol, coroner.”

“That’s me,” Namjoon says as he shakes the man’s hand, thankful for a distraction. “Nice to meet you. Sorry for the delay. Tell me about the scene, please.” 

“Of course,” Chanyeol says as they begin to walk towards the club. 

“You should know that the station gets calls from this place all the time. Shootouts, drug deals, drunks complaining about the owner winning too many times when they play cards with him. Things we normally handle quietly in this part of town because these things happen pretty commonly.”

“Sounds about right,” Sehun comments as they stop just outside the door. “But why call for LT this time?”

“This time is different,” Chanyeol nervously sighs. He begins to tap away at his tablet, bringing up a call log. “We got a call about thirty minutes ago from a guy that was buying snacks across the street at the convenience store. Said he saw a bunch of people run out here before he heard gunshots a few minutes later.”

“You’re gonna kill us with the suspense, Mr. Park,” Sehun says, trying to lighten the dark atmosphere. “You wouldn’t even let me step foot into the club before LT got here. Why?”

“The caller went into the club out of curiosity. What he found… We thought a detective such as Lieutenant Kim should be notified.” Chanyeol warily looks between Sehun and Namjoon before he pushes the door open. “This is why.”

“Jesus Christ,” Namjoon mutters as he looks at the scene.

Dark blood and bright flower petals are all the detective can see. The flower petals, they’re everywhere. A few cover the lifeless bodies on the floor as it leads to one part of the room. If there wasn’t so much blood covering the floor, the scene could be placed in a museum. It’s a literal piece of art.

"We think Picaro did this," Chanyeol says. "That's why we called you."

“What is that smell?” Sehun groans as he covers his nose.

It’s a smell Namjoon has become very acquainted with, but even he has a difficult time warming up to the smell when he comes across it. He swallows down the bile that’s threatening to come up and winces at the iron-like smell coming from the dead bodies. 

It heavily clouds the room, which leads him to say, “If blood smells like this you can tell that it’s mutant blood. Paired with the presence of adrenaline makes it even more potent.”

“We tried to suppress the smell as best as we could,” Chanyeol says, unaffected by the smell he’s grown accustomed to. "We opened a few windows."

“What the hell,” Sehun mutters as they near a group of people wearing hazmat suits and approach a body half-lying face down on a poker table.

Two knives wedged in the dead man’s hands is the only thing keeping him from falling off the table.

“Victim’s name is Lee Taemin,” Chanyeol tells them. “The owner of the club.”

In Namjoon’s years of service in mutant affairs, he’s never seen a more violent crime scene. He’s glad Sehun is his partner on this case. His new partner needs to grow a thick shell if he wants to work in Seoul City, and especially on this case.

Chanyeol looks down at his tablet again. “He’s got multiple accounts of aggravated assault and theft. Pretty popular on this side of town. Wouldn’t doubt he had ties to the black market with the company he keeps.” Chanyeol guides the men through an obstacle of holographic numbers annotating evidence on the floor. “We found out tonight that he’s a mutant.”

Namjoon walks towards Taemin’s body. His sharp eyes catch the vibrant colors lining the back of Taemin’s neck. This is definitely Picaro's doing. He turns towards Chanyeol. “Did you scan for fingerprints?”

“We did, but they’re unidentifiable. The guy must have had their fingerprints burned off. The same goes for the fingerprints on the daggers,” Chanyeol supplies.

Namjoon scans his surroundings along with the other cops in the room, looking for any signs of forced entry or broken windows of a quick escape. He doesn’t find any.

“You think they just walked in?” Sehun asks.

“Yeah,” Namjoon nods his head. “Just like they did at the hospital with Doctor Keng.”

But how did they escape is the question that sits on the detective’s tongue.

Sehun makes his way over to the hazmat team, asking them to send their samples of evidence to the station as soon as possible.

Namjoon stares at Taemin’s body. He didn’t want another corpse to turn up in his investigation, but he’s determined to endure to get closer to catching Picaro.

Kim Yoona, Keng Wonbin, Lee Taemin. Who’s next on Picaro’s list?

“LT, they’re gonna take the bodies to the morgue now. Wanna head back to the station?” Sehun asks.

“I’m gonna go to the morgue,” Namjoon replies. “I need to speak with someone there. Start looking at the evidence without me. I'll be at the station soon.”

Sehun nods at that. "I'll get the coffee pot ready. We're gonna need it."

Tzuyu sighs she pushes the goodbye key on the hospital’s telephone and she returns it to where it’s mounted on the wall.

The TV in the small office is turned to the news channel. Tzuyu glances at it, catching a glimpse of a reporter talking about a murder at a club. She rubs her temples as she sits back down at her desk. Her night shift has barely started and she’s already overwhelmed. Her hands are sore from the growing number of autopsies she’s had to perform recently. 

More and more mutants are taking up room in her morgue. Suicides and hate crimes are the leading factors of how these bodies end up here. Every report she writes makes her angrier by the day.

Mutants didn’t ask to be treated this way. Mutants are just everyday people like humans...they're just not _normal_.

But the thing that makes her upset the most is how mutant bodies she receives that have contracted Hanahaki disease. Tzuyu can’t count on her fingers how many bloody flowers she’s cut out of the mutant's lungs. She can still feel the phantom pain of flower petals pushing against her lungs.

She takes a deep breath, trying to calm herself—trying to remind herself that she’s alive. She never looked at the flower the same way again. She felt no remorse throwing out the bouquet of roses Hoseok got her a few days ago.

The double doors to the entrance of the morgue suddenly open and Tzuyu bolts up from her seat, pulling on a tight smile as a human nurse pushes a white cloth-covered gurney into the room.

The woman yawns as she stops just short of the door, visibly keeping a distance from Tzuyu. 

“Body’s ready for you. Let us know if you need anything,” the nurse says monotony as she exits the room.

Tzuyu knows very well that phrase means the very opposite. She doesn’t care anyway. 

Being the only mutant that works the night shift in the hospital’s morgue has its perks. Human bodies go to separate while mutant bodies come to hers, she doesn’t have to encounter rude stares or unwanted conversations with her human coworkers and, most importantly, the mutant bodies don’t give her weird looks. She finds an odd sense of comfort in their closed eyes.

Tzuyu rolls the gurney to the center of the room. She looks at the code printed on the tag hanging off the gurney and types it into the laptop stationed on the northern wall. Her eyes grow wide at the name that pops up.

Lee Taemin.

_Seulgi’s Lee Taemin?_ Tzuyu thinks.

She walks back over to the gurney and lifts the cloth to answer her own question. It looks like he's dead for over an hour. She’d never wish death on people she doesn’t like, but she'd be grateful an abusive man such as Taemin is out of her friend’s life.

Tzuyu shrugs on her personal protective equipment and gets to work. She carefully cuts open Taemin's skin and all the way down into his battered chest cavity. She finds bloody petals in Taemin’s lungs, which is a common sight for her. Seulgi did mention that her boyfriend was coughing a lot recently.

Tzuyu works meticulously over the body. She does a whole head-to-toe inspection, trying to find anything out of the ordinary. What she does find is a long strand of dark hair within Taemin’s blonde locks. She carefully pics it up with a pair of tweezers before she runs the strand of hair through her quick scanner and finds that it belongs to Seulgi.

Not wanting evidence of her friend showing up on Taemin’s report, she rips off her gloves and runs to her office before she rips open a drawer in her desk to find a lighter one her coworkers left behind. She burns the strand of hair with a relieved sigh.

Tzuyu makes a mental note to call Seulgi after she gets off work.

Moments later, Just as Tzuyu has recovered Taemin's body and is writing her report, the double doors behind her open. A man with bags under his eyes flashes his badge at her before he introduces himself.

“Lieutenant Detective Kim Namjoon, SCPD Mutant Investigations Task Force,” the man quickly rattles off in a rehearsed manner.

Tzuyu can’t help but make herself smaller as Namjoon glares at her Marker. 

“Chou Tzuyu. Can I ask why you’re here, sir?” she carefully questions.

“Lee Taemin’s body is a part of my investigation," Namjoon tells her. "I'm here to gather some evidence from his autopsy report. Can you tell me what you found?”

“Well, he was dying of Hanahaki Disease, but whatever mutant killed him prevented him from dying a slow death,” Tzuyu starts as she guides him over to Taemin's body. “His labs came back showing high levels of drugs, alcohol, adrenaline in his system. The paint on his neck was strange—”

“That came from the mutant that killed him,” Namjoon interrupts. He lifts the white sheet from the body, looking at Taemin's hands. "Were you able to get any DNA from under his nails?"

Tzuyu shakes her head. "Only his. He kept his fingernails pretty clean."

"Have any guardians, friends or loved ones showed up since his body arrived?" Namjoon asks as he drops the sheet.

"Other than his dead friends across the hall, no," Tzuyu answers. "And judging from the number of flowers in his chest, I doubt whoever his soulmate is will be visiting him either."

Namjoon clenches his jaw. “Is there any evidence you found on his body that can associate him with anyone he could be close to? Like hair, bodily fluids, or something of that sort?” When Tzuyu tells him no he huffs again. “Is there someone else more qualified that I can talk to?”

“Am I wasting your time, Mr. Kim? I’m just answering your questions to my best ability.” Tzuyu crosses her arms over her chest, growing defensive. She guesses Namjoon would rather speak to a human than someone like her. “Or you can wait until the person for the day shift comes. They’ll only read off my report and tell you the same thing.”

“That’s _Lieutenant_ to you,” Namjoon spits.

“And you’re standing in _my_ morgue,” Tzuyu counters. “I can easily drop the formalities, but I like being respectful even when some people can’t be.”

Namjoon steps back with an irritated sigh and he storms out of the room. Tzuyu tuts her tongue as the double doors close. If a cop can’t interact with someone different than themselves they shouldn’t be hired to protect people.

Remembering the report about the club on the TV from earlier, Tzuyu moves to her phone. She quickly finds the number she wants and calls it.

_“Polar?”_ a deep voice yawns.

“Kitty? Where are you?”

A bit of shuffling and door closing sounds through the receiver before Jimin continues the conversation. _“At home. Why?”_

Tzuyu sits down at her desk. “I just saw the news. Were you at—”

_“Yeah. Do you have Taemin’s body?”_

Tzuyu tucks away Taemin’s papers into their respective place in a filing cabinet. “I just finished his report and a rude cop came in.” 

_“What's the cop’s name?”_

“Kim Namjoon,” Tzuyu tells him. She turns around in her chair to look at the door leading into the morgue. “He's looking for anyone connected to Taemin. They got a smart detective on your tail now. As desperate as I am for Picaro to find Glass, you guys need to be more careful from here on out."

_"We'll find Glass before this detective finds us,"_ Jimin says earnestly.

"Other than Picaro, you're lucky there's no trace of you and the other boys," Tzuyu sighs. "But there I did find something else, which is why I’m calling. I need you to find someone for me.”

Jimin is quiet for a bit, and Tzuyu thinks he's fallen asleep on her before he speaks again. _“Who do you need me to find?”_  
  


“A friend of mine. She’s tied up with some bad people, especially Taemin.”

_“What’s her name?”_

“Seulgi. Kang Seulgi. She also goes by Echo.”

_“She’s actually with me right now,”_ Jimin says, a small smile lacing his tired voice. _“She’s good, Polar. She’s sleeping.”_

Tzuyu’s eyebrows furrow at that. “What? What do you mean she's with you?”

_“She was at the club when we came. Took her with us after we finished with Taemin... Turns out she’s my soulmate.”_

Tzuyu finds herself smiling at that. She never thought Jimin would ever find his soulmate with him building his inner walls so high. But for Seulgi, she wants the whole world for her.

“Since you're with my best friend, you know I’m gonna have to give you a talk soon,” Tzuyu says seriously, but with a bit of amusement. 

“And here I was thinking _I_ was your best friend,” Jimin quietly jokes. “I know, I know. I’ll be waiting for your lecture.”

Tzuyu swivels around in her seat as she grins, but the reporter on the TV takes it away. Jimin is just about to hang up when Tzuyu calls out for him. 

“Kitty, the stuff on the news doesn’t look good for us,” Tzuyu says warily. “That protest you’ve been planning, you need to do it soon. Too many mutants are coming into my morgue and the hospital doesn’t have the staffing to handle the load.”

“Okay, I’ll get things rolling. Lemme know if you need anything, okay? I’ll have Seulgi call you as soon as she wakes up,” Jimin promises. “We’ll talk later.”

Namjoon taps the space bar on his computer, ending the voice recording.

His hunch was right and he's glad he decided to place a small microphone in the room. There had to be someone on the outside erasing evidence from every crime scene involving Picaro.

"Well, I'll be damned. So that's why you went. To bug the room," Sehun chuckles from his seat. "No wonder you're so famous, LT."

Namjoon puts down his second coffee of the morning on the desk beside the laptop. "Focus, Oh," he softly reprimands.

Sehun quickly recomposes himself, comically taking on a hard demeanor such as Namjoon's. He swivels over to the large monitor to his left, tapping away until he finds what he's looking for. 

"Chou Tzuyu. Twenty-nine years old. Married to Jung Hoseok—oh my, God! I love his videos!" Sehun says excitedly. He glances over at Namjoon to find the man glaring at him. "Sorry. She works at Seoul City Hospital's morgue. Other than a few hospital visits over the past few years, her record is clean, LT."

"Although we know she's hiding evidence can't arrest her just for the voice recording. We gotta find what she's hiding." Namjoon sits back in his chair and he crosses his arms over his chest. “She could know the whereabouts of Picaro.”

“I don't know, LT. We have nothing that connects her to the death of Kim Yoona or Doctor Keng. Maybe the mutants she mentioned may be directly connected to him. Kitty and Kang Seulgi, a.k.a Echo,” Sehun adds.

Namjoon racks his brain for how they approach their next step in this investigation. They need to get more learn more about Tzuyu and her connection to Kitty and Echo. Then they need to find whoever Kitty is. The faster they do that, the closer they'll be to catching Picaro.

Sehun clicks on an image next to Tzuyu’s name, enlarging the photo to take up the whole screen.

"She's one of Hani's clients," Namjoon says as he stares at her picture.

"How do you know that?"

"I've seen her before, leaving Hani's clinic not too long ago. No wonder she looked so familiar," Namjoon says as he whips out his phone from his pocket. “Hani, I’m sorry to call you so late, but this is important. Tell me everything you know about a woman named Chou Tzuyu.”

Jin wakes in the morning to Taehyung’s hushed whimpering coming from across the hall. 

Snow heavily falls outside the window at his bedside. He tiredly sighs and winds his long legs out of bed, slips his bare feet into a pair of house shoes, and shuffles out of the room and into the hallway.

Jungkook is already there, standing outside of Taehyung’s room with a sad look on his face as his arms hug around his torso. The soft light pouring through the cracked door makes his concerned irises a lighter brown. 

“Jin hyung,” Jungkook softly calls as Jin slides the door to his room shut. “This episode has been going on far longer than the others. I think something’s wrong. Please, do something.”

Jin quietly pulls Taheyung’s door open. The last thing he wants to do is startle Taehyung awake when he's like this. 

Taehyung is mumbling incoherently and he thrashes a bit as he clings to a pillow. 

Jin pads closer to Taehyung's bed as pulls on an extra pair of gloves sitting on Taehyung’s dresser. He carefully sits on its edge before placing the back of his hand on Taehyung’s sweaty forehead. 

Taehyung’s eyes race back and forth behind his eyelids. Jin can tell Taehyung is currently having _that_ kind of dream, the kind of dream where his clothes cling to his skin and he's holding his bedsheets with a vice-like grip.

Taehyung has been having them occasionally ever since his late wife died while giving birth to a stillborn a year ago, but they’ve been happening more frequently as of late and it’s been worrying Jin to no end.

“Is he okay?” Jungkook asks as he shuffles into the room. He stops just short of the bed, but he’s close enough to peer over Jin’s shoulder.

Jin closely watches the way Taehyung’s pinched eyebrows relax when he gently smooths away the hair clinging to Taehyung’s damp temples. “I think he’s okay.” 

Taehyung unconsciously moves his cheek into Jin’s covered palm as the older cups his jaw. He murmurs a few distant words before his eyes snap open and he grabs Jin’s covered wrist, making the older jump at the suddenness. 

Relief washes through Jin as sleepy confusion bleeds into recognition across Taehyung’s face. In any other situation, Taehyung would pull out of the elder's touch, so Jin advantage of this moment as clasps his other hand over Taehyung's fingers and he attentively leans in. 

“Tae?" Jin softly calls.

“Jin hyung, I saw her,” Taehyung happily whispers. 

He warmly smiles and a stray tear streams down his face. Jin is quick to catch it with his thumb. 

“I saw her face! Her skin glows like gold, and her nose is just like Yoona’s. Her laugh sounds like music, hyung.”

A plethora of questions sits on the edge of Jin's tongue as Taehyung scoots out of his thin sheets. 

Taehyung clambers over to his art station on the other side of the room, making the automated lights that surround his art supplies turn on. He digs through a messy pile of paper and drawing tools to find a pair of spectacles.

Jungkook steps forward but he makes no move to touch Taehyung, although he very much wants to so he can understand what's going on with Taehyung. “Taehyungie hyung, are you okay?”

Taehyung glances at Jin and Jungkook. “Sorry. I didn’t mean to wake you,” he apologizes. 

He sets a clean, medium-sized canvas on an easel, and before he begins to quickly fill the blank space with a pencil.

“That’s okay, Taehyung,” Jin easily says. “But can you tell us what’s going on? We’re worried about you.”

Taehyung ignores the question, whispering under his breath as he continues to draw. He bites at his lips and he pushes his glasses up the bridge of his nose. "I have to draw it before I forget it. I-I have to, Jin hyung—draw it before I forget, _draw it before you forget, Taehyung, draw it before you forget_ ," he mutters to himself.

Jin sends a worried look to Jungkook before he speaks. “Tae, you should get back in bed. It's way too early to paint.”

The words go right over Taehyung’s head. A few loud scrapes of the pencil against the canvas sound in the room before Taehyung suddenly stops. The room is quiet as Taehyung moves to stand in between Jin and Jungkook to admire his work. 

Jungkook and Jin take in the picture Taehyung just drew. 

It’s of a young girl. Her eyes are crescent-shaped as she smiles. The slope of her nose comes to a soft point just above her plush lips and her hair falls over her shoulders. Her head is angled up as if he’s peering into the sky. 

Jin realizes Taehyung’s walls are filled with various drawings and paintings of this same girl, but they’re all taken from different angles and unfinished. 

The one in the middle is the only one that actually has a face.

“I think she’s alive! She was talking to me, but I couldn’t hear her voice. I-I couldn’t hear her—I couldn’t hear what she was saying,” Taehyung tells them, slowly growing frantic. He pushes the heels of his palms against his eyes and groans. 

Jin has half a mind to slap Taehyung back into a stable state.

“I-It’s okay, Taehyung. We’re getting closer. It’s okay,” Taehyung mutters as he tries to calm himself. He begins to pace around the room. 

Jungkook grabs onto Jin’s arm, his breathing picking up with fear. “Hyung, something’s not right.”

“Taehyung, stop!” Jin yells. 

He steps in front of Taehyung and grabs him by his shoulders. When Taehyung meets him with a shocked expression, he internally winces. 

“Taehyung,” Jin tries again, softer this time. “These dreams you’re having, they are _just_ dreams. That’s it. And this girl you keep drawing, she may be your daughter, but she passed away, Taehyung. I'm sorry, but she's not alive. The more you linger on this, the worse you'll become. This needs to stop, okay?”

Taehyung’s shoulders fall in Jin’s tense grasp and his face slowly starts to harden as tears begin to well in his eyes. “Do you think something’s wrong with me?”

“What?” Jin balks.

“I said, do you think something’s wrong with me?” Taehyung repeats through gritted teeth. 

He blinks away his tears and he doesn’t even let Jin answer before he speaks again. 

“Do you think something’s wrong with me because I haven’t had a full night's rest in a year? Do you think something’s wrong with me because I've been dreaming of someone I never got the chance to meet but have come to love?” Taehyung asks as his bottom lip begins to wobble. 

He quietly pulls himself away from Jin’s gloved hands and looks at the ground. He wraps his arms around his middle and he shrinks in on himself. 

“Sometimes I start to believe it myself. That something’s wrong with me. I see the looks I get from you and Jimin. I'm not blind… But, hey, all I’m good for is anonymously selling off my art as long as I'm not in the way. Isn't that right, Jin hyung?” Taehyung bitterly asks as their eyes meet. 

Jin bristles as Taehyung’s muted anger is suddenly thrown at him. 

“I've already apologized countless times for saying that, Taehyung,” he weakly counters.

“I may have forgiven you, but that doesn’t mean your words still don’t affect me.” Taehyung shakes his head and he dejectedly glares at the two men in front of him. “I won’t apologize for what has become of me, but the very last thing I need is my own friends thinking that I’m strange.” 

He turns and exits the room, leaving Jin and Jungkook to take Taehyung’s absence as the ending of their conversation. A moment later they hear the front door slam and they both flinch.

Jungkook silently leaves the room, knowing better than to go after Taehyung when he’s upset, and Jin stays. He takes this opportunity to study Taehyung’s works. 

One piece of art catches his eye in particular, one where the little girl is happily holding a small flower. 

Whatever this is, Jin knows it’s more than he can comprehend at the moment. He walks over to the control panel and he turns off all the lights in the room before he slides the door to his room shut.


	7. Interlude [Kitty]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “You have until the morning to be packed and out of this house. You're not welcome here anymore. I will not have a mutant for a son.”

* * *

**INTERLUDE: Jimin's Origin**

* * *

_A few years ago_

**Sungwoon**

_Where are you?_

**Jimin**

_I’m coming_

_I just got out of ballet class_

**Sungwoon**

_Better hurry up!_

_Someone’s got a mistletoe for you_

Before Jimin can reply, the red streetlight turns green. His thumb maneuvers the screen back to the GPS before his foot presses down on the gas pedal, heading to one of the many parties his friends have planned for Christmas break.

He almost chose not to go out tonight. He felt a little sick during his class, but he decides that nothing is stopping him from enjoying his senior year of high school.

Jimin's phone vibrates as a new message appears on the screen.

**Tae**   
_I blame you for this_   
_I’m literally hiding in the bathroom bc your gf won’t stop asking about you_

Jimin stops at another red light before he texts his friend back.

**Jimin**   
_She’s not my gf_

**Tae**   
_Well she thinks differently_

A few moments later, Jimin's car rolls to a slow stop before he turns off the engine. He steps out of the car, instantly hit with the bitter winter air. 

He takes in his surroundings as he rubs his hands together only to notice that there are none. Nothing but woods surround him, save for a clearing that houses an old building next to a body of water reflecting an upside-down image of an industrial scaffolding. The place seems abandoned, but Taehyung looks up to see some sort of gathering on top of the five-story building.

“Jimin! Finally,” Sungwoon yells as he pushes through the worn front door of the building. “Can always count on you to be fashionably late,” he chuckles as he hugs Jimin. 

Jimin playfully rolls his eyes as he pulls away from his friend’s embrace. “So this is the party, hyung? We’re literally in the middle of nowhere.”

“Yep, this is the place,” Sungwon happily sighs as they both look towards the building. “Abandoned warehouse. Perfect for loud parties.”

They enter the building and Jimin is surprised the elevator even works. A distorted ding rings through the cabin and as they exit, loud music fills Jimin’s ears. The roof of the building is full of people dancing, drinking, and making out with one another like there is no tomorrow. 

Goosebumps travel across Jimin’s skin as a small hand grabs onto his bicep.

“There you are, Kitty,” a girl smiles as she tilts her chin up to wink at him. “Didn’t think you’d show up.”

Jimin pulls her into his chest and he rests his lips against her midnight hair. “And miss seeing you? No way.”

“Y’all are disgusting,” Taehyung says as he pushes through the crowd towards them. “Yah, Jiwon, didn’t I tell you I’m the only one that can call him that.”

“But it’s a cute nickname,” Jiwon pouts as she clings to Jimin.

Jimin swallows down a sudden lump in his throat as he sends a tight smile to Jiwon. 

Jiwon has been a close family friend ever since Jimin can remember. She and Taehyung were the first friends he made when he started going to school. He even has an old picture of them when they were younger. A small Taehyung sits in between them as they brightly smile at the camera.

A part of him wants to date Jiwon, but another part of him knows this potential relationship will only end in heartbreak for both of them. He needs to tell her he feels. He’s been pushing it off for months now and if he’s not careful, they’ll be halfway through their first semester of college without coming to terms with the big elephant that lingers in the room.

Jimin gently pulls away from Jiwon’s grasp. “I’m gonna go get us some drinks.”

Jimin shuffles through the thick of the crowd and over to a makeshift self-serve bar set up on the far corner of the roof. Although the music is blasting in his eardrums, it is a bit quieter in this area. He sits on the very last stool, socially distancing himself as best as he can even though there’s one empty seat separating him from the next person at the bar. 

He plays with his gloved fingers and he sighs. He can't help but feel wistful as he looks at the red string tied around his wrist. The small tendril wraps snuggly around his wrist, gracefully resting upon the ever-beating radial pulse just under his thumb.

Fate. Something that he tries not to think about for the sake of Jiwon. The string of fate is supposed to be a joyous thing. A thing that binds you to the person who you’re destined to be with until the day you die.

Jimin pours a shot for himself. He needs a bit of liquid courage before he heads back to his friends. He then fixes two drinks for himself and Jiwon. He moves to pick up the beverages when his movements falter as his fingers phase straight through the red solo cups.

His eyebrows furrow as he holds his hands out in front of his body. He wiggles his fingers, thinking that they're broken. He feels his forehead to check if he has a fever. He has been feeling strange this week, but he'd blame it on the weather. 

_Weird_. He must have just imagined that.

Jimin grabs for the cups again, this time successfully gripping them. His fingertips tingle against the plastic, but he ignores it. He returns to his friends with a grin on his face. He hands Jiwon a drink as Sungwoon and Taehyung sip on their own. 

“So is this all we’re doing tonight?” Jimin asks over the music. “Getting drunk off our asses until the party ends?”

Taehyung smiles mischievously as he sets his empty cup on a nearby table. “Nope. We’re going skinny dipping, hyung.”

Jimin’s eyebrows shoot up at that. “You do realize we’re in the middle of winter, Tae,” he scoffs.

“That's what makes it even more fun!” Sungwoon says.

“Are we heading back to your house then?” Jimin asks, amused. “I don’t think your mom would like us swimming in your pool at this time of night.”

“Oh, no,” Taehyung shakes his head before pointing across the roof to the scaffolding. “We’re gonna jump from there.”

“Excuse me? You want me to jump from _where_?” Jimin wheezes as Taehyung stands in front of him with a dubious expression on his face. Jimin couldn’t even get a drink in before the younger male was dragging him into the elevator and out of the building.

Taehyung and Sungwoon stand on either side of Jimin as Jiwon makes herself at home on the hood of Jimin’s car.

Sungwoon licks his lips and smiles giddily. “So, here’s the deal, Jimin. We’re gonna jump from the scaffolding into the water below one by one. Whoever does the most flips before they hit the water wins,” he explains.

“I can jump with you if that’ll make you feel more comfortable, hyung,” Taehyung says reassuringly as Jimin warily eyes the tall structure.

Jimin warms at Taehyung’s thoughtfulness but that doesn’t hide his grimace. He turns to Sungwoon. “Tell me we can at least keep our underwear on. We're in mixed company,” he says gestures toward Jiwon.

Sungwoon’s eyes suddenly glaze over. “Keep your underwear on,” he parrots without delay.

Jimin’s eyebrows pinch together. He’s never seen the older male give in so easily to his requests before.

“You think Jiwon will come after me when she sees how big my dick is compared to yours?” Sungwoon jokes.

“You wish,” Jimin tries to laugh off. He runs a hand through his hair, his forbearance wearing thin.

Jiwon kisses his cheek before she hops off the jeep. “It’s not that bad. I’ve done it before. It's fun,” she tries to assure him.

“Unlike me, you love heights,” Jimin comments with a small smile. Jimin eyes Sungwoon before he relents with a reluctant huff escaping his lips. “Okay, fine. I’ll jump.”

Taehyung happily howls to the dark sky as they both take off their clothes, stripping down to their underwear as a quick breeze rolls by. Jimin throws their clothes into the back of his car before taking Jiwon’s hand in his own as they near the scaffolding.

“Hey, Kitty.” Taehyung tosses his arm over Jimin’s shoulder and gives him a small smile as Jiwon stands next to Sungwoon at the bottom of the scaffolding, near the water's edge. “Don’t sweat it. We’re just having fun. You can back out if you want.”

Jimin smiles back at him. “And regret not doing this for the rest of my life? As long as we jump together, it’ll be fine.”

Anything he does with the younger male is ten times better. He’s going to miss Taehyung terribly. They both are parting ways after they graduate, going to different universities on opposite sides of the country in the fall with promises to meet up as much as they can. If jumping into cold water is something that Jimin can write in the book of him and Taehyung, he’ll happily experience it.

Taehyung leads as they climb the ladder before they reach the top of the structure. He shivers as he nods at Jimin, gesturing for him to walk down a narrow walkway that overlooks the water below. A crowd is starting to congregate at the edge of the roof now, the situation sparking their attention.

“Yeah! C’mon, let’s go!” Sungwoon cheers from below.

Jimin walks forward with ease, placing one foot in front of the other with ballerina-like expertise as Taehyung casually walks beside him. 

“How deep is it?” Jimin asks as they reach the end of the walkway.

“We’re about to find out, aren't we?” Taehyung shrugs. “Alright, on my count, okay? Three, two, one. Jump!”

It all goes in slow-motion. They both move forward without hesitation. Their cold toes leave the platform as they jump into the air. Jimin’s stomach drops as he quickly descends towards the dark water.

Sungwoon hoot and hollers as Jimin and Taehyung fall into the water. Freezing water surrounds Jimin before he knows it. The loud splashes prompt Jiwon to laugh and bounce on her feet. 

Jimin chuckles in disbelief after he resurfaces. He can’t believe Sungwoon and Taehyung convinced him to jump off of a fifteen-foot scaffolding. 

Things go quiet as they wait for Taehyung to resurface. A few seconds later, Taehyung’s head comes bobbing through the water, but he isn’t moving.

“Tae?” Jimin calls out, his voice full of concern.

“Oh, my God,” Jiwon gasps. She looks at the metal pipes running from the top of the scaffolding into the water. "In the water… There are pipes," she mutters.

Sungwoon bounds over the fence separating them from the water and he kneels down, trying to get a closer look. Taehyung isn’t moving at all. “Jimin!” he yells. "I think he’s hurt!”

Jimin quickly swims over the younger male and grabs his arm to turn him over. His eyes go wide when he sees blood leaking from a huge gash in Taehyung’s forehead. 

Jimin curses under his breath as he pulls Taehyung towards the landing. Sungwoon is helping him pull Taehyung’s wet, limp body onto the dry ground when police sirens sound in the distance. 

“Jiwon, get out of here!” Sungwoon says hurriedly, turning her away from the scene. He turns to Jimin as the younger is pulling himself out of the water. 

“We need to get him to a hospital,” Jimin grunts as he kneels over Taehyung.

There blood everywhere. Jimin pushes Taehyung's wet hair away from his forehead and winces at the angry gash on Taehyung's skin. He's definitely going to need stitches.

Sungwoon disagrees. He tries to pull Jimin away from Taehyung. “Jimin, don’t—we need to get out of here, man!”

Jimin falls on his butt as he snatches his arm away from Sungwoon’s grasp. “What? We can’t just leave him here like this, hyung!”

The red and blue lights begin to shine through the trees. The crowd from the party is evacuating the abandoned warehouse and vehicles are skidding away.

Sungwoon, seeing that Jimin isn’t budging, begins to move towards his car. “C’mon, we don’t have time!”

“Leave then!” Jimin screams. “I’m not leaving him! Go run your car into the ground, for all I care! Taehyung won’t forgive you for this. Neither will I.”

Sungwoon's eyes glazed over again and he runs off without another word. He feels bad for leaving them, but he can’t afford to get caught by the police.

Jimin tugs Taehyung's unconscious body onto his back and he runs to his car. He carefully lays Taehyung in his backseat before he hops into the front seat. He jams his key into the ignition and cranks the heat up the way as his half-naked body violently shivers.

“Everything’s gonna be okay, Tae. I’m gonna get you to the hospital,” Jimin says shakily as his eyes waver between his friend and the road. 

He speeds through a group of police cars with ease. The police don’t even bother to entertain a chase once they see a huge crowd of teens leaving an abandoned warehouse.

Jimin haphazardly pulls his car in front of the entrance of the hospital's ER in record time. He leaps from his seat and yells out for help as he opens the back door to grab Taehyun's body. A group of nurses and doctors come to his aid and carefully lift Tehyung’s body onto a gurney.

Everything is happening too fast. Taehyung is nothing but a blur as he disappears into the hospital.

A nurse grabs Jimin’s attention before he falls apart at the thought of his best friend dying. “Sir? Can you tell me what happened?”

“We jumped into the water,” Jimin explains as he holds back a sob. He wipes at his eyes, irritating them and making them red. “He hit a pipe—God, I didn’t know there were pipes in the water.”

The nurse looks him in the eyes. “Okay, we’re gonna get your friend into surgery as soon as possible. Can you tell me his name? Are you a family member?”

"Uh, no. I'm not. Wait a second—"

Jimin runs back to his car to get Taehyung’s wallet. Without thinking, he phases through the back door of the car as he reaches through Taehyung’s and his clothes to grab the wallet. He runs back to the now distraught nurse, holding out the wallet towards them. “His name is—”

“You’re a mutant!”

"What?" Jimin looks confused for a second, wondering why the nurse called him that. He surely isn’t. Jimin knows he doesn’t have any powers…he’d definitely know if—

He looks back at the car. He doesn’t remember opening the back door or closing it. His eyes grow wide. Jimin thinks back to the party, about how his fingers went straight through the red solo cups.

Jimin feels sick to his stomach. _There's no way I presented! There's no way!_

The nurse reaches for their phone in their pocket. Before they have a chance to call the authorities, Jimin stops them.

"W-Wait!" he almost yells. "Please don't call the cops! Just act like this didn't happen!" he tightly demands.

The nurse's face becomes stoic as they drop their hand from their pocket. They turn on their heels and head back into the hospital without another word. 

Jimin looks around to make sure no one else saw what just happed before he runs back to his car. He ghosts through the driver’s side door and speeds away from the hospital. His surroundings pass by him too quickly and he’s parked in front of his house before he's fully aware of his surroundings.

Jimin leaves his clothes in the back seat as he stumbles away from his car. He trips on his own two feet as he climbs the front doorsteps and he unexpectedly falls forward, bracing himself to slam headfirst into the front door, but instead, he falls through it.

Half of his body lies inside the house while his legs lie atop the prickly welcome mat just outside the door.

“Jimin?”

Jimin snaps his head up to find his parents staring down at him. Jimin opens his mouth to make up some excuse, but his mouth opens and closes like a fish above water. 

Silence fills the room. His mother begins to cry as she storms out of the room and his father’s face fills with disappointment as he reaches for his phone.

Jimin knows he’s doomed. The last thing wanted was to present as a mutant. He never imagined the day would come where he'd anything other than a normal human being.

His father grits his teeth as he dials 9-1-1. “Hello, we have a mutant on our residence... Yes, we need him registered as an abnormal,” his father says into the phone. His eyes never leave his son as he ends the call. “You have until the morning to be packed and out of this house. You're not welcome here anymore. I will not have a mutant for a son.”

Jimin’s body sinks against the floor at his father’s words. Police sirens can be heard in the distance. Jimin’s eyes fill with tears as his father leaves the room. His parents are abandoning him. He'll wear a Marker for the rest of his life, which will be a symbol of his parents' negligence.

Jimin always thought he’d make a few enemies here and there—that’s what life is about, right? Love your loved ones unconditionally and conditionally love your enemies, but tonight Jimin realizes that unconditional love turns rotten at some point, even if that love comes from his own biological parents.

Jimin soon finds himself at a police station around people with hardened faces. His picture is taken along with a scan of his fingerprints. A Marker is thrown at him and he's threatened to wear it before he's escorted home.

What is home? He can't call the place he grew up home anymore. It's no longer somewhere he can feel safe and loved. Jimin checks his phone as he stands outside his parent's house. Maybe he can crash at a friend's house—no, they'll see his Marker.

Jimin carefully opens the door and tiptoes his way to his room, trying not to bring any attention to his return. He silently cries as he packs his bags, his tears fall onto the belongings he's able to carry.

He sits in his car, the only thing that he owns before he cranks the engine and slowly pulls out of the driveway. He heads back to the hospital and parks in the almost empty car lot. He easily falls asleep, too drained from the night's sudden events.

The morning sun shining through the windshield is what wakes Jimin the next morning. He takes off his Marker before enters the hospital. He spots Taehyung's parents in the lobby, seeming as though they're leaving after spending the night with their son.

Jimin avoids them as he approaches the reception desk. He clears his throat. "Do you know which room Kim Taehyung is in?"

One foot hesitantly steps in front of the other before Jimin finds himself standing at Taehyung's bedside. He takes the younger male's hand in his own as a stray tear runs down his cheek. He hates the sight of the large bandage wrapped around Taehyung's injured head.

"Tae, I'm so sorry," he sniffs.

Taehyung's eyes slowly blink open. His eyes look to the hand holding onto his before they travel to Jimin's face. "Who are you?" he wearily asks.

Jimin's world falls at that. "W-What?" he mutters as he grows confused at Taehyung's words. "It's me, Jimin. You, um, you hit your head really bad last night."

Taehyung's eyebrows pinch together as he sluggishly pulls his hand away from Jimin's grasp. Jimin staggers back as a hurt expression crosses over his face.

"I don't know you," Taehyung mutters as he tries to keep his heavy eyelids open. "Where are my parents?"

Jimin backs himself into the door with tear-filled eyes. He blindly reaches for the door handle before he pushes it open. He runs as fast as can away from the room. He bumps into a few people before starts to phase through them. Screams of fear fill his ears before his legs give out beneath him.

Jimin falls into the present, into Jin's warm embrace as he cries loudly. "It's my fault," he bawls into Jin's shoulder. "He left because he thinks I'm gonna leave him!"

Jin hesitantly wraps his arms around the younger male. "It's okay, Jimin. He's not going to leave you—"

"But I left him! All those years ago—God, he doesn't even know," Jimin whimpers.

Jin pulls back to look Jimin in the eyes. "You mean you haven't told him what you just told me?"

Jimin sniffs and shakes his head as he moves to sit on his butt. "No. As far as he knows, we met after he presented. I can't tell him, hyung. He'll hate me."

Jin sighs. He would tell Jimin that Taehyung needs to know the truth, but that'll only make him seem like a hypocrite as he's holding a secret from his own soulmate.

"Tell him when you're ready then," Jin suggests as he stands up. "I was going to track him down and talk to him, but you should be the one to do that."

"Okay," Jimin softly replies as he pulls himself together and rises to his feet. He swipes his car keys from the wall near the front door. "I'll, uh, take Seulgi with me. We'll be back soon."

Jimin leaves the foyer only to return with his soulmate holding his hand. He opens the door, gesturing for Seulgi to exit first before Jin calls for him.

"What happened to your friends? The ones from the party?" Jin carefully asks.

"I think Jiwon married her soulmate not too long ago... She's still normal."

"And Sungwoon?"

Jimin looks at Jin for a long time, wondering if he should tell Jin the truth before he reluctantly says, "He died in a car crash on his way home."

Jimin closes the door behind him after that, ending a conversation he doesn't want to continue. He knows Jin will think differently of him now. He wouldn't blame Jin if he already does. He should be scared. Jimin is even afraid of his powers at times.

But right now, he focuses on one thing at a time. And right now, he needs to find Taehyung and bring him back home. 


	8. The Fourth Episode

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Why fight for them to change our surroundings when we can do it ourselves?” 

**_[ Meanwhile... During the third episode... ]_ **

The elevator rings with a soft sound as the door slides open. The sound of Glass's heels on the white tiled floor echos through the lab's brightly-lit foyer. 

"Hirai Momo, Na Jaemin, Lim Jaebom," she lists pensively as she sets down her briefcase next to a table littered with buttons and blinking lights in the corner of the room. "How are they?" she asks a man sitting in front of the table.

When she gets no response she eyes the man with concern before she moves over to the digital display panel on the table and scans over the respective vitals of the people she just named, deeming them fine.

“Bullseye?” she calls, still waiting for the man to answer.

Bullseye bristles in his chair and swivels around to find Glass staring down at him. “Sorry, uh, yeah, they’re fine,” he informs her. "Welcome home."

Glass hums in acknowledgment as she takes the empty next to Bullseye. She sighs in relief as she kneads her sore thighs.

Bullseye glances at her. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine. Standing up all day is a pain sometimes," she assures him. "Anything to report?"

“Jaebom’s lung is almost healed and Jaemin was screaming in his sleep again, but other than that, everyone remained stable while you were gone,” Bullseye tells her.

"That's good to hear."

Glass looks into the rooms circling the lab's foyer. Unconscious bodies lie on metal beds in their respective glass cubes as IV lines are hooked into them. A few nurses shuffle about between the rooms, tending to the bodies. She crosses her arms over her chest as she then looks into Momo’s cube, of the two cubes that are made of a special kind of plastic so she can’t manipulate it with her power.

Glass’s heart sinks at the condition of her childhood friend. Maybe things would be different if the government didn’t shut down the Institute after the incident, forcing many young mutants to find their own way into a world that doesn’t accept them.

She thinks back to late nights where she would find Momo crying in their shared bathroom back at the facility. She can still hear Momo’s cries about not wanting to be a mutant anymore, how she just wanted to normal to get away from all the testing and probing.

And here she is now, probing her friend and other mutants for her own selfish tests. But she tries to tell herself this is for the greater good, that the work she’s doing here can give people the choice of whether or not they want to be mutants once they present.

“We did an X-ray on all three of them,” Bullseye softly speaks. “The stems Professor Yi cut from their lungs aren’t growing anymore.”

“Something Dr. Keng couldn’t do,” Glass comments. “Shame he was killed. He was my only way of getting mutants down here without any suspicion from the public.”

“I don’t think you’ll be needing any more bodies,” Bullseye insinuates.

Glass eyes the mutant next to her. “Why is that?”

“Something interesting happened tonight: except for Momo, everyone’s red strings turned white.”

Glass’s curiosity peaks at that. “A red string of fate changes characteristics when its owner comes into contact with their soulmate.”

“And it can turn black when that soulmate loses their other half,” Bullseye adds. “Which is what happened to Momo. I did some digging earlier. Turns out her soulmate was Lee Taemin. Some guy that worked inside the black market. Seemed like he was interested in having multiple relationships. He died about an hour ago. His face is all over the news.”

The room is quiet for a few moments after that. A few nurses bow as they pass by Glass and Bullseye before retreating for the night.

"Do you remember how we found Momo?" Glass softly asks.

"Doctor Keng had her escorted here," Bullseye replies.

"I found her way before that, actually," Glass says as shakes her head. "Now that I can put a name to his face, she was with Taemin one night. I found my way into his club after we fought one night."

"I thought you weren't going to come back that night," Bullseye recalls. "I still can't believe you threw Jinyoung's piss on me."

A small smile creeps on Glass's lips. "You deserved it," she jokes. "But, anyway, after a few drinks, I heard her voice in my head. She was so scared. It was like she calling out for someone— _anyone_ —to help her, but no one could hear. So, she sees me from across the room and I gesture over to the restroom, she follows me there without raising any suspicion. She locks us one of the stalls, she turns around to look at me, and we just stare at each other, too distraught to believe we're in the same place... She just starts to bawl her eyes out. Without her verbalizing it, I could see everything that happened to her during the months we were apart."

"I know you still blame yourself," Yoongi says.

"I can't help it." 

Guilt eats at her every day, but she’s glad Momo is here under her care now. 

Glass blinks away the tears the threaten to spill over. "I should have gone with her into town that day. I thought she would be fine. At the time, we lived in a tiny apartment complex that was funded by the government. We were surrounded by other mutants, but little did I know humans are lurking around to snatch mutants up and force them into their sex trafficking ring."

"She said she realized had Hananki when she caught Taemin in bed with another woman," Glass continues. "She said he was reluctant to let her go to the hospital."

"But he was desperate when he contacted me about you," Bullseye scoffs. "He just wanted to save his own ass. He only cared about himself."

"That's why this cure is so important. I want mutants to be able to choose whether or not they want to be mutants, whether or not they want to be tied by a string on their wrist."

The air suddenly grows heavy around them as soon as those words leave Glass's lips. Yoongi awkwardly clears his throat as he shifts in his chair. This topic is a sensitive one for them.

“The question of why the other’s strings turned white still resides,” Bullseye says as he gestures to the unconscious mutants, changing the topic.

Glass steals a glance at him before she looks at Momo. “Maybe because they successfully broke their bond with their soulmate without either party dying, which has been a goal from the start. This is good news.”

She breathes a sigh of relief. Her cure is finally working. Maybe she broke a few of her morals to achieve her goal, but she’s just glad that she can change society and potentially garner a better future for mutants.

“You still have their documents from the hospital, right?” Glass asks.

“The ones that state their agreement and consent to lose their connection to their soulmate?” Bullseye asks. “Yeah. Why?”

“We’ll need it when the nurses wake them up. They may not remember.”

Glass rises from her seat with a bit of difficulty and Bullseye is quick to steady her with a hand under her elbow and the other on her waist.

"Careful," Bullseye gently warns.

“These leg braces are starting to hurt my hips after wearing them all day,” she sighs as she leans her weight into Bullseye’s hold. “Help me to my room?”

Bullseye silently bends down to wrap his arms around Glass’s back and the back of her knees. He settles her against his chest and Glass wraps her arms around his neck before they move to the elevator. The ride up is quiet save for their breathing.

“Sometimes I wish I knew what you were thinking,” Glass says as she leans her head against his shoulder.

“I don’t think you’d like what’s in my head,” Bullseye huffs as he adjusts his hold under Glass’s metal-bound legs.

The doors open to the main floor of a house and Bullseye carries Glass to her room. He sets her down on her bed before he kneels in front of her. He presses a few buttons on the side of her leg braces to separate the metal down length of her legs before carefully pulling her legs out.

Bullseye places the metal contraption near the bedside table as Glass begins taking off her shirt and bra. He returns to her side, raising her by the armpits to help her stand. She places her hands on his shoulders in a routine manner, breathing slowly as she uses the strength of her arms to keep her balanced as he pulls down her pants and underwear with practiced ease.

Glass lowers herself back down on the bed when her pants are around her ankles and Bullseye takes her dirty clothes to the hamper in the corner of the room before carrying her to the bathroom. He sets her down on the edge of the tub and moves to start running the water when Glass stops him with a gentle hand on his wrist.

“I got it, Yoongi,” Glass tells him, calling by his real name since they're alone."

“Okay.” Yoongi moves away with a stoic look on his face. “I’ll be right outside if you need me.”

He closes the door behind him before he rests his back against it. He exhales deeply as he looks down at his hands. They're battered with old scars, but his red string of fate never fails to catch his attention. The small tendril wraps snuggly around his wrist, gracefully resting upon the ever-beating radial pulse just under his thumb. 

Fate. Something that he tries not to think about. A thing that binds you to the person who you’re destined to be with until the day you die. The string of fate is supposed to be a joyous thing.

But not for Yoongi. Not when he's bound to the person that's just on the other side of the door, a person he least expected.

* * *

**EPISODE 4: Pursuit of Change**

* * *

Jimin grips the steering wheel as he weaves through rush hour traffic. His knuckles turn white as his fingers curl over the black leather. He makes a quick right turn at a yellow light, slightly jostling the car before the traffic light turns red.

“ _Hey, Kitty. Where you at? The protest’s gonna start with you_ ,” a voice says through the speaker of Jimin’s car.

“Start without me,” Jimin replies curtly. “Something came up, but I’ll join you guys later.” He presses the end call button with a frustrated sigh.

Jimin is upset. He woke up to Jin gently shaking him awake from his pleasant sleep to find that his childhood friend never came home after leaving earlier in the morning. 

Taehyung never runs off without letting someone know. Jimin blames himself for his friend's sudden absence. _Maybe he's upset I found my soulmate. Maybe he thinks I’m gonna—_

“Jimin, slow down.” Seulgi places a gentle hand on Jimin’s wrist, just over his red string of fate. “You’re driving too fast.” 

Jimin glances over at her pale eyes before he turns his attention back to the road. “Sorry, I just—” 

“He means a lot to you. I know,” Seulgi says gently. She squeezes Jimin’s wrist before she lets go. “But we’re not gonna find him if we’re dead on the side of the road.” 

Jimin takes a deep breath as he eases his foot off the gas pedal. He turns on the radio and lets the soft music calm him down a bit. Snow softly hits the windshield before it’s wiped away from the windshield. 

“Tzuyu called me last night. She asked about you,” Jimin says after a while. 

Seulgi turns to him. "You know Tzuyu?" 

"We went to high school. Knew each other before we presented," Jimin explains. "Anyways, she asked about you. She told me to tell you to call her when you get the chance. She sounded worried." 

"Figures," Seulgi sighs as she crosses her arms over her chest. "She didn't like that I was Taemin. She even told me to leave when I showed up at the hospital after he—" 

Jimin clenches his jaw at Seulgi cutting herself off with a pained expression on her face, growing angry at the thought of someone hurting his soulmate. 

"I should have listened to her... But I stayed, as stupid as that sounds," Seulgi huffs. 

Jimin makes a left turn and picks up a bit of speed before slowing down behind a car. "Why didn't you leave him?" he carefully asks. "He was abusing you." 

"Trust me, I wanted to. Him talking about Glass is what kept me from leaving," Seulgi admits. "It seemed like he was close to finding them, so I stayed with him because I wanted him to find the cure." 

“Finding Glass doesn't guarantee a cure.”

“That's true,” Seulgi agrees sufficiently. “But their name wouldn't be on the streets if the rumors weren't true. They're the closest thing to achieving normalcy I'll ever get.” 

Jimin’s eyebrows almost touch the ceiling at that. “You wanna be normal?” 

“You don’t?” Seulgi asks, almost scoffing at her soulmate’s question with amusement. “You're crazy if you wanna be a mutant for the rest of your life.”

“I'm not crazy.” Jimin shakes his head as merges into another lane on the road. “Just hopeful.” 

“Hope can only get you so far,” Seulgi sighs. “Living like this is hell, Jimin. I’m tired of putting on this damn Marker every day and having people deny me my basic rights as a living person.” 

“We can change that. We can show people that mutants aren’t a sore eye to society,” Jimin pushes, trying to convince her. “We just gotta make them listen.” 

“How long will it be before they start listening? How will it take for mutants to be able to live as freely as humans? Do you think just words are gonna change what they think?” Seulgi asks. “You’ll die using your mouth before you start using your fists.” 

Jimin clenches his jaw, briefly tapering off the conversation. Seulgi’s words may have some truth to them, but Jimin thinks differently. Standing up for mutants and speaking out against their mistreatment should be the first step to get society on their side. Jimin wants to see a world where his parents can come back around and understand him, to see that the blood that runs in his veins is the same color as theirs. 

“Violence isn't the answer for this situation,” Jimin counters.

“But it is when it comes to other mutants?” Seulgi retorts. “From what happened last night with Taemin—it seems like you and Taehyung would kill anyone that's in your way, human or mutant. But I understand where you're coming from, don’t get me wrong,” she quickly adds. “I want a society where humans and mutants can coexist peacefully just as much as you do, but that reality isn't gonna come to fruition any time soon.”

Jimin stays quiet for a while as he thinks over his decisions that lead him to this moment. Sometimes he doesn't remember what exactly he's fighting for when it comes to Taehyung. He just knows that he'd do anything for Taehyung, even if it means killing, even if it means finding a cure for him to be normal. 

The cure means nothing for Jimin. He doesn't mind the stares and scowls he gets when he's in public. He just wants to exist. 

Jimin looks over at his soulmate. “I'd do the same for you.” 

“Do what for me?” 

“Find the cure for you.” 

Seulgi snorts at Jimin's successful attempt to lighten the mood. “Isn't that taboo? You'd be in a human-mutant relationship with me?” 

Jimin shrugs his shoulders. “Your friend is dating a famous Youtuber that's human,” he jokingly reminds her. 

An unreadable expression flashes over Seulgi’s face. “That's different.” She quickly pulls on a tight grin. “He's too famous to face any repercussions by being with a mutant.” 

“Well, we won't have to worry about that once we can get the humans to understand us.” 

Seulgi smiles sadly at Jimin’s perseverance. “You told me last night that we're just as human as the next person. They don't think that way—they're not going to think that way any time soon. So why fight for them to change our surroundings when we can do it ourselves?” 

The car grows quiet after that. Jimin swears he's heard Taehyung say the same thing before. But for Taehyung, the only thing on his mind is being normal again. Jimin thinks he should find his normalcy in being a mutant, but that's an argument they've already had plenty of times. 

It's not like Jimin doesn't already know that. He just refuses to admit to it. Taehyung and Jin are looking for a cure to be normal again, Jimin wants him and other mutants to be accepted by society, and Jungkook is caught in the middle, not fully knowing what he wants just yet. 

For right now Jimin will keep the situation at bay, but the peace within the eye of a hurricane can only last for so long before the storm rages again. 

"Let's just focus on finding Taehyung for now," Jimin says, redirecting the conversation to the task at hand. 

“Do you know where he’d run off to?” Seulgi asks. 

Jimin mentally searches for places his friend might be in his mind, which isn’t many since there aren’t a lot of places mutants are allowed into. He and Seulgi are stopped at an intersection near a bar when Seulgi grabs his arm. She snaps her head towards the car’s radio and shuts it off with the blink of her eyes. 

Seulgi rolls down the window and she listens, pointing her ear to the brick building with no windows. She blindly points to the establishment before the street light turns green. “Something’s happening in there,” she tells him. 

Jimin doesn’t question her as pulls off the road and into a parking lot. They both take off their Markers before they exit the car and head towards the alleyway to find the bar’s entrance. 

Jimin rips the door open and his eyes instantly find Taehyung just as he’s being punched in the face.

The burly man who punched him winces as he cradles his fist in his hand. Wisps of steam coil from his broken skin as he glares accusingly at Taehyung. “A mutant! I should’ve known,” he snarls. “Get him out of here!” 

Another man steps forward and sends a brutal blow to Taehyung’s stomach with his fist. Taehyung stumbles and his back hits the edge of a pool table, interrupting a couple’s game of one-pocket as he licks at his newly-busted bottom lip. 

A smug simper pulls at the corners of Taehyung’s lips and the tips of his fingers glow a vibrant purple. The feeling of retribution seeps into his veins as a few sharp-edged playing cards tickle the hem of his trench coat. He could take out everyone in the room if wanted. He wouldn’t even break a sweat. 

Jimin and Seulgi rush forward before things get violent. A few onlookers within the bar take out their phones and start to record the ordeal. Seulgi picks up on the frequency of the handful of phones pointed at her, Jimin, and Taehyung. With a flick of her wrist, she overloads the handheld devices until they overheat and shut down. 

With a wild look in Taehyung’s eyes, he guides his sharp-edged playing cards from his coat and out in front of him in a perfect ring that surrounds his body. Taaehyung runs the numbers in his head. There's only a small number of people in the establishment, they all stand around the three mutants in a circle.

Taehyung chooses that moment to do the unthinkable and Jimin’s eyes widen, knowing what the younger male is about to do. 

Taehyung’s eyes glow purple as he moves his arms quickly, sending the cards flying in all directions. Jimin practically clotheslines Seulgi to the floor and he shields her from Taehyung’s wrath.

Jimin squeezes his eyes shut as shrill screams reach his ears. He curses at himself for not telling Taehyung to stop, but the younger male isn’t as susceptible to Jimin’s power of persuasion as other mutants and humans. 

The sound of wet thuds hit the floor one by one and eventually, the screaming dies down until all that’s heard is the music that’s softly playing on the radio and the beginnings of a peaceful protest passing by just outside the bar’s blacked-out windows.

Jimin cradles Seulgi’s head into his chest as looks up at Taehyung only to find Taehyung already looking down at him.

Taehyung has a look in his eyes that Jimin has never before. A look of madness, desperation, guilt, and relief mixed into one. A kind of look that tells Jimin that Taehyung is changing into a completely different person than what he once knew.

Seulgi's whole body shakes with terror in Jimin’s arms. “He killed everyone,” she gasps. She blinks her eyes to shut off the music and she frantically places her hands over her ears. “I can’t hear their heartbeats.”

The doors burst open a moment later, revealing Jin and Jungkook as they abruptly stop to take in the scene that just unfolded.

Jimin slowly rises to his feet, helping his soulmate up from the floor before he shields her from Taehyung with his body. The radio suddenly comes back to life as Seulgi clamps her hand over Jimin’s string of fate.

  
  


_Here we are as in olden days… Happy golden days of yore_

  
  


Jin, Jimin, and Jungkook stare at Taehyung like he’s a mad man.

  
  


_Faithful friends, who are dear to us, gather near to us once more…_

  
  


A weak moan sounds in the room and everyone turns towards it to find a woman writhing in pain on the ground near a collapsed bar stool. A playing card is lodged in her throat and dark blood is gushing from around it.

Taehyung silently moves towards her, removing one of his gloves before placing his hand on her bare arm. She groans as the veins in her arm begin to swell and darken.

Vibrant colors leak from Taehyung's fingertips and onto her skin as her eyes roll back into her head. She chokes on her breath as her skin turns pale. Taehyung grips her arm tighter and he breathes in deep as his busted lip heals. He doesn’t hesitate to take what little life the poor woman has left as his busted lip magically heals.

“Hyung…” Jungkook breathes. His stomach churns as he watches. His vision begins to tunnel before he turns away to look at the window.

There’s such a stark difference between what’s going on both sides of the glass. Mutants are raising their voices for the very thing Taehyung has just taken away. Life.

The woman’s head lolls to the side as she breathes her last breath. Taehyung puts his glove back on and turns to his friends. He holds a blank expression on his face before he says, “You should go join your protest, Jimin hyung.”

Jimin balks at that.

“What the hell, Taehyung?” Jin scoffs, growing angry. “Do you realize what you just did? On all days, you choose today to do something like this!”

“Yes,” is all Taehyung says, a bit too resolute for Jin’s liking. 

With the flick of his pointer and middle finger, he rips his scattered deck of cards from the lifeless bodies lying around. The cards float through the air and into a pocket into his trenchcoat. He then turns to the entrance of the bar and he gestures towards all the tables and chairs, making them float through the air before he makes a barricade against the door.

Taehyung heads towards the back door and Jimin is hot on his heels while Seulgi, Jin, and Jungkook follow behind. The winter air slaps them in the face but it only fuels Jimin's anger. Just as Taehyung is about to round the corner to the street, Jimin yanks at his clothes, keeping him hidden in the alleyway.

"You think a few tables and chairs are gonna stop the cops from finding you?" Jimin seethes. "Going out the back door isn't going to erase what just happened here."

Taehyung clenches his jaw, already done with the lecture he knows Jimin is about to give. "It will buy us time," he counters as he pries Jimin's hand from his coat.

"What were you thinking going to a human bar and using your powers?" Jimin asks incredulously. "God, You're lucky they didn't call the cops on your ass, or else you'd be halfway to the police station right now. Did you forget that you're a fucking wanted man, Tae? If you're trying to get your cover blown, you're doing a good job at it."

"Oh, so it's my cover now? I thought we were in this together, hyung," Taehyung quickly counters. "Your soulmate pops up out of the blue and suddenly things are different!" 

"Things are different! I'm not gonna say sorry I found my soulmate, but that doesn't give you a reason to go drinking in the middle of the day and break laws that can get you executed without question."

"I decided to go there! I should be able to go wherever I want and do whatever I want! Why can't I go out like a normal person and—"

"Because you can't!" Jimin shouts. "You're not normal, Tae! You can't do reckless things like this. Going to a human-only space by yourself and putting people in harm's way for your own benefit—” 

"Yeah," Taehyung says bitterly. “Blame everything on me like you always do, huh?” 

“Because you never think before you do anything!” Jimin yells back. 

“I don’t think before I do anything? Oh, that's rich coming from you, hyung,” Taehyung scoffs. “How about you tell that to all the people you put six feet under within the past year.”

"Watch what you say, Tae," Jimin warns gravely. "Everything I do is for you." 

"And everything I do is for all the mutants that live in this country!" Taehyung yells. "These protests aren't working, Jimin. We need to take the upper hand. The time is now."

Jimin shakes his head. "You didn't have to come here. We had a plan—"

"Well, now there's a new one. _Mine_ ," Taehyung emphasizes. "I didn't come to this bar without a reason."

"He gained a new power," Jungkook interjects with a disappointed look on his face. 

"The woman I touched inside, she was what the cops call a tracker mutant. She has a similar mutation to Jungkook, heightened senses. But what she has that's special is a power called mental detection," Taehyung explains. "Tracking down Glass will be a hell of a lot easier now."

Jimin exhales tiredly. He hesitantly steps forward. "You know this isn't gonna bring her back, Tae."

The sound of protestors fills the alleyway as they march by. The atmosphere in the alley weighs heavy at Jimin's words.

An expression of hurt crosses Taehyung's face before he clenches his jaw and stares at Jimin with a sad but determined look in his eyes. "It seems like we have to choose a side now."

Taehyung doesn't wait for a reply. He quickly turns on his heels and blends into the crowd on the street.

**Author's Note:**

> I hope you enjoyed this chapter. Lemme know what you think, I am very appreciative of feedback.
> 
> See you in the next chapter ~


End file.
